Aiming To Be The Best
by CelticBlackRose
Summary: Doing a favor for Shou didn't seem like a good idea and watching people play soccer soccer wasn't something that appealed to me, but hey, I have nothing better to do, so might as well. I never imagined that being an assistant coach for the Momoyama Predators would end up catching the eyes of the Demon Triplets.
1. Prologue

**Hello! So this is actualy my first ever story, I usually just read fanfiction but upon seeing that there are so few stories about Ginga e Kickoff! I decided to give it a go haha.**

 **Any constructive criticism and comments are welcome. I plan to go through the whole series with a few tweaks to the plot line here and there to fit my Oc in. This is a romance between the Furuya triplets and the OC, if you are uncomfortable with this sort of thing, then this is not for you.**

 ***Disclaimer; I do not own Ginga e Kickoff! All rightful credit goes to the creators. The only things that are mine is the plot line, whatever changes I make to it and my OCs.***

I was never good at sports nor had I the actual desire to play any sports. For one, I had no hand-eye coordination whatsoever! Not even kidding, sure I tried a few sports here and there like tennis, volleyball, soccer, basketball, hockey, you get the idea...

But it always ended in me getting hit, me hitting someone or just plain falling over.

Yeah, I'm definitely not meant to play sports, the only thing I did/could do sport wise was run, but that was mostly only because my mother used to be a track star and when I was old enough, she took me with her for morning runs. I'm actually pretty good at it and shomehow managed no to end up face plainting every five seconds, which I took as a personal victory/miracle. You would too if you fell over everything and anything including your own feet.

Anyway, running was pretty much the only thing I could do sports wise. However I had no desire to compete in running. I prefered music. I could play the piano, violin and the flute. I also sometimes, only by myself in my room, mind you, sang. Not in front of people though, I'd probably faint.

It wasn't running or music that got me the position of being an assistant coach to the Momoyama Predators though. Everyone called it a gift, but I prefer to just call it high observation skills. The fact that I had an eidetic memory probably helped, but just a little bit.

Apart from becoming an assistant coach, which is all thanks to Oota Shou, I was truly not at all prepared to catch the eyes of the Demon Triplets, nor was I prepared to fall for them while trying to get the team to antionals.

Yeah I was never good at sports...


	2. Encounter

**So here it is! The first chapter!**

 **"Speaking"**

 _ **'Thinking'**_

 _ **Please comment/ review. i would love to know what you think. :)**_

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It was going to be one of those days. You know, the ones where it seemed like nothing was going right, where the world seemed to be against you and no matter what you did on these days, you were destined for inevitable failure? Alright, so I'm being a little dramatic but then again who isn't.

And because of one defining moment that happens at the beginning of the day, you could without a doubt know, that it was going to be one of those days. Well for me, Shimakage Yumi, it was the moment I sort of fell out of bed twice, yeah I'll explain the 'sort of' in a second.

You're probably wondering how I could base the 'its going to be a horrible day status' on something as minor as simply falling out of my bed? Firstly, falling out of bed is an unpleasant experience on its own, but the fact that the first fall was due to being tangled up in my bed sheets thus causing me to roll around till I fell onto the floor, which hurt by the way, only to get up and conveniently trip over my feet because of one foot being tangled in my blanket and the other was stepping on said blanket. So when I tried to take a step with the tangled foot I obviously fell over. Secondly, falling over twice in the time span of five minutes is one, not a great way to start the day and two, certainly sets the bar of how said day was going to go.

So yeah, it wasn't going to be a pleasant day.

Recovering from the fall like a pro, I got up, brushed myself off and went about my early morning routine. It consisted of changing into some running clothes, tying my long black hair into a high ponytail and finally grabbing my favorite pair of running shoes for my morning job of delivering newspapers. It was something I rather enjoyed doing. Delivering newspapers gave me an excuse to go for a run, not that I needed one but it was nice to earn some extra pocket money along the way instead of just running around, you know.

When I got downstairs mom was already in the kitchen, nursing a cup of coffee, making breakfast and reading today's newspaper all at the same time. How she managed this without burning anything, including herself, was still a mystery to me. If I tried that I'd most likely end up the hospital because if you haven't noticed, I can be a bit clumsy.

"Morning Yumi" she placed the newspaper down to look at me. "I heard some noises coming from upstairs. Did you fall out of bed again?"

"No..."

"Yumi."

"Okay maybe I did." Her only response to that was to sigh while continuing to make breakfast. Mom often wondered where I developed my clumsiness because I sure as hell didn't get it from her, maybe I got it from dad? He was after all a business investor who spent more of his time in meetings than he did outside. He wasn't an outdoorsy person to say the least. I looked more like my father than my mother since I inherited my father's jet black hair and my skin tone was also more on the pale side like my fathers' rather than the tan skin tone my mother had. My electric blue eyes came from my mother though and with the combination of skin and hair color, it made them stand out a lot more than they needed to in my opinion but I liked them all the same.

My eidetic memory was something that didn't come from my parents. It was something that was discovered in me when I was around four. The fact that I could remember details about events that occurred a year before was a little strange considering most toddlers could only remember small things here and there. So at that age, for me to state the exact place and time of an event that occurred a year ago including minor details was a rarity.

Not like it mattered to me anyway, just cause I could remember a lot of things didn't mean it made life easier. I mean, how would you feel if you remembered EVERYTHING? Every sight, sound, smell, taste, etc. or that you were constantly reminded of things you once saw because you heard a specific sound or smelled something similar, yeah not so cool now is it. Not that I'm complaining though, seeing as I do use it for memorizing my music sheets or for studying.

"You're going to be late~" The slight teasing in mom's voice brought me back from my not-so-exciting thoughts to look at the clock, only to realize that she was right _'Crap'_ it was already ten minutes past five. Trying to save time I tried tying my shoelaces while hopping towards the door which only resulted in me falling, again.

 _'Today is not going to go well'_

Ignoring mom's not-so-hidden giggles I managed to get out of the house and ran towards the news agency. Once I collected my load and apologized for being late I was off.

The sun was now rising from the horizon and I was reminded of another reason I liked running in the mornings. Sunrises were beautiful. Don't get me wrong sunsets were too but there was just something about sunrises than made me feel blissful. But my blissful moment however, was brought to an end when I heard the sound of a dog barking. _'I shouldn't have gotten out of bed today'_ was the only thing that came to mind as I was chased for about three blocks by the annoying little terror of a dog that made chasing me its favorite hobby, lucky me I guess.

Once I got some distance between me and the little terror, I made a turn onto a different street in hopes of losing it. It worked and the little devil ran right past and they say dogs are smart because this one clearly isn't.

The sound of someone hitting a tennis ball caught my attention and I realized that I was near the tennis courts. Considering how early it was, I became curious as to who exactly would be playing at this hour. _'It couldn't hurt to look'_ So I made my way over and saw that it was none other than the Furuya triplets.

The only reason I knew who they were was because of a kid in my class, Ooto Shou. We were sort of friends I guess, he would sometimes ask me to watch him practice soccer and point out what he was doing wrong, but I couldn't actually show him how to correct anything because I couldn't play soccer. So I tried describing what he should do the best I could. I also stated numerous times that just because I knew a lot about soccer didn't mean that my advice would be good, but Shou seemed satisfied with my observations none the less and continued asking me for help.

Shou also told me about how the triplets quit the local sixth grade soccer team, the Momoyama Predators, because of the coach which resulted in him getting fired and the other members of the team slowly leaving one by one. Sad really, considering Shou's so passionate about soccer and would most likely turn out to be an incredible player one day, though I'm sure he'll figure something out.

Back to the triplets, it seemed like Ryuuji and Kota were versing each other while Ozou observed. It was a pretty good match too which is not surprising seeing as the brothers had a knack for playing any kind of sport. Something which I thought was quite amazing seeing as I couldn't play any. The small fact that they were all equally attractive in similar and different ways only made them more appealing. Not that I have a crush on them or anything. I'm just making an observation and enjoying the view. What? I'm a girl.

"Looks like we have an audience" And low and behold all three of them, with their piercing red eyes, were looking at me. Ozou smirked at Ryuuji's remark, who was looking at me curiously while Kota was just plain staring with this sort of serious but blank look he always seemed to have on his face.

 _'Crap, I was so distracted with my thoughts that I didn't notice the match had ended...'_ Now their attention was on me, which was somewhere their attention had never been before, so it was rather unnerving. So me being the awkward turtle that I am, blushed bright red, shouted a quick "Sorry" and high-tailed it out of there as fast as my legs could carry me.

 _'You're an idiot, now they probably think you're weird.'_

Anyway, I finally finished delivering newspapers and came home around seven-thirty to an empty house seeing as mom had gone to work and dad was out of town on a business trip. So I ate breakfast and got ready for my music lesson at noon. It was Sunday so I didn't have to worry about school stuff today. Good thing too seeing how this day was already turning out to be a mess, it would most likely end in disaster if I had homework, again I can be a bit dramatic.

The music lesson went pretty well, not trying to brag here but I'm pretty good, at least I thought so. My teacher keeps saying that there's always room for improvement but I think that if can play a solid piece without making any mistakes that there should be some type of reward to go with it, like a gold sticker or one of those little trophies that says 'Well Done' or something. Needless to say, he didn't think it was very funny. He constantly reminded me that just because I remembered all of the material, didn't mean I could slack off, which was true, even if I did remember the music sheets I still needed to learn and practice how to play them. Still, it'd be nice to get a sticker.

The lesson ended around three in the afternoon and mom wouldn't be home for another two hours so I figured taking the scenic route home through the park would be a good idea. The good in that idea however ended when I got a soccer ball to the face. _'I should've stayed in bed'_ Holding my nose, I squinted my eyes and looked to see who was the cause of my now aching nose and it just happened to be Oota Shou, great.

"Ahh! Yumi-san! I'm so sorry, I was trying to steal the ball from Zach and accidentally kicked it too hard!" He looked really frantic as he said this. "Its fine no harm done" That not true, my nose hurts but he relaxed slightly, which was better than having him shout in my ear. I then noticed a brown-haired girl and a black dog behind him. _'I'm guessing Zach's the dog then.'_

After apologizing again, the girl introduced herself as Takatou Erika. _'She seems nice'_ Then they started explaining the reason why Shou was trying to get the ball from Zach. It was to show he was skilled enough for Erika to practice against or something like that. I kinda stopped paying attention. That is until Shou asked me something that brought me back to earth.

"Did you wanna join our soccer team, Yumi-san?"

 _'Wait, what now?'_

"Join your soccer team?" I repeated only to make absolutely certain that I heard him right. He nodded in response. "Yeah, since there was a lack of players the Momoyama Predators were disbanded and now I'm trying to make a new team." He explained it as if that cleared up why he wanted _me_ on the team, it didn't, especially since he knew that I sucked at sports. "So you want me join your team because..." maybe some prompting would get me the answer to this deranged request.

"Because you've been really helpful with my practices, so I thought maybe you could do that for the team?" Ah, so that's why. "Shouldn't you have coach to do that though?" It was a true fact that if you wanted to succeed in soccer you'd need a coach and I most definitely wasn't qualified to do that, I was also too young.

"It would be better to have a coach because they would actually be able to show you instead of me just trying to explain to you." Shou seemed to understand this and accepted it while Erika didn't really seem to care either way.

I finally made my way home and with the long day I had, the only thing I wanted was to eat dinner and to go to bed but when I got to my front door I realized two things. One; the door was locked. Two; I didn't have a key on me. That could only mean one thing! I locked myself out of the house.

 _'I should've stayed in bed.'_

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 **Thanks for reading.**

 **Not quite sure how I'm gonna fit my oc in yet haha**


	3. Speed Star

**Chapter three! Looks like they're just getting longer haha**

 **Dialogue is such a pain T.T**

 **Again thank you in advance for reading, please review and tell me what you think.**

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Endless chatter filled the classroom as I looked around to see the same scene that played every Monday morning. Friends were gathered in groups and discussing what they all had done on the weekend, you know, typical Monday stuff. Today's topic though was about how we were getting a new student and everyone was trying to guess if it would be a boy or a girl. Yep, real exciting stuff, not.

I however wasn't all that interested in today's conversations because there was something rather strange happening in the seat next to mine.

 _'I wonder what happened to make him so quiet'_

Shou, who would usually be the loudest out of all of us, was sitting quietly at his desk and looking out the window with a distant look in his face. Maybe it had something to do with soccer? Oh who am I kidding, of course it has something to do with since that was all he seemed to think about these days.

He didn't even seem to hear the teacher coming in and was only startled out of his thoughts when she called out to him. "Oota-kun, class has started already." He instantly sprang up and apologized with a sheepish grin on his face. He could be pretty entertaining sometimes but only sometimes, he was still way too loud.

We both seemed to only then notice that the person standing next to the teacher was none other than Takatou Erika, I managed to hide my surprise better than he did. Erika seemed socked to see him too, luckily she didn't seem to notice me and why would she. We hardly spoke the other day and I was currently hiding the half top of my face behind my bangs and under the hood of my favorite black hoodie.

The two boys in front of us were now asking Shou if she was his girlfriend to which he blushed and profusely denied. But it didn't work because soon most of the class was teasing him.

 _'Pour Shou'_

"SHUT UP!"

Well, Erika's very loud shout got everyone's attention and practically burst our eardrums in the process. Man, that girl has a serious set of pipes. Glad I wasn't at front because I might have lost my hearing if I was.

Erika then went on to introduce herself and explain what her interests were. Which was mostly about how much she loved soccer, even more than food. She needs to get priorities straight, food is way better than soccer.

She also explained that there was nothing going on between her and Shou but I wasn't listening because I still was trying to wrap my head around anything being better than food. Maybe music came in at a close second but food was definitely on the top of my list of things that I enjoyed.

Anyway, she was now seated behind Shou, much to her displeasure, and next to someone I could actually call a friend and that was Saionji Reika. Reika was by far the nicest person I've ever met. She was shy and timid but all together a very kind-hearted and supportive person. Surprising really since she comes from a rather wealthy family. We'd somehow become friends at a business function our families had attended.

The sound of the school bell ringing made me realize that zoned out, again.

 _'Dammit Yumi, focus!'_

"Yumi-chan, do want to come help me show Erika-chan around?"

 _'Huh?'_ I really need to start paying attention more. "Sorry what was that Reika-chan?" I finally turned around and moved some hair out of my face.

"Hey! You're that girl from the other day!" Man, look like we got another loud one. "Uh, yeah. Sorry I didn't really introduce myself properly, my name is Shimakage Yumi." She nodded at me in greeting, "And I guess I could come along, got nothing better to do."

As we walked down the hall Reika was pointing out what was where. I mostly stayed quiet. There wasn't much to say really, it was a school building. They kinda looked the same to me.

"It's similar to my old school, so I can remember it all easily," Erika stated looking very happy about the whole situation. _'See what I mean, they all look the same.'_ Reika looked relieved, "Thank goodness."

"I should be saying that! I'm really lucky to have made nice friends like you and Yumi-chan."Erika looked at the two of us as she said this. Reika looked extremely happy, seeing as both of us didn't really have a lot of friends because Reika was rather shy due to her sheltered lifestyle and I just wasn't the best conversationalist, to say the least.

"I'm really happy to be your friend too" Reika's timid voice brought me back to the conversation.

"Really?"

"Yup! Your very cheerful and frank with the guys as well. I'm jealous." Erika blushed, "Well, I'm always surrounded by idiotic boys, so I'm used to it" She scratched her head nervously. _'Wonder what says about you.'_ I guess it was pretty cool that she was the way she was. Heaven knows I could use some of that frankness. Reika then asked something about soccer, which made Erika stop walking and look away from us with a sheepish expression.

We ended up stopping the tour outside, we were standing under a tree while leaning against it. Erika had explained something about Shou trying to start a new team and how the manager had said that two players couldn't do anything to change the situation. I understood how the anger and frustration she felt. It was rather disgusting, as she put it, for the manager not to encourage Shou in trying to start a new team. Shouldn't a manager be happy about the prospect of having a team to manage?

"Shou-kun's doing his best," Reika said and I may not be a fan of his loudness but I did admire his determination. Great things happen to those who do anything to make it happen instead of just waiting around for something good to happen. Erika looked up at the sky through the tree branches, "I was the ace on my old team," she said with a proud look on her face. "Oh? Wow!" I wasn't as enthused about it as Reika but I was slightly impressed. Only slightly though.

"I've always been really fast, so everyone called me Speed Star." _'What kind of a name is Speed Star?'_ Erika then seemed to go off on a day dream, most likely a good memory seeing as she had a smile on her face. Reika was obviously impressed and complimented Erika on it but I had to wonder about Erika's mindset. Was she stuck in the past? Was she questioning whether or not to continue playing soccer because there isn't a sixth grade team or because she was afraid she wouldn't get any better?

 _'Stop trying to analyse her, Yumi. Remember, assuming stuff about people was rude.'_

But I couldn't seem to stop myself and narrowed my eyes,"But you can still level up a lot more." Erika looked at me with a stunned expression and to be honest I don't know why I said that. "Uh..sorry." I looked down with a small blush, my bangs covering my face again. She seemed to shake it off, "No, it's okay." _'Great, my mouth ran away from me again.'_ Reika looked at me sympathetically.

"Ah! Found you!" I was, for once, glad to have Shou yelling and breathed out a sigh. Erika however, did not look too happy. "You were over there? I looked all over!" And now I wish he'd stop yelling, the gratefulness didn't last very long. What can you do?

"What do you want?" Erika asked annoyed by his sudden appearance, Reika was hiding behind the tree slightly and I stayed where I was, no point in moving. "Nothing really!" He replied eagerly and unnecessarily loud.

 _'Then why are you looking for us, dummy.'_ Yep, grateful feeling was definitely gone now.

"I called Misaki-san yesterday!" I didn't know who that was, probably a soccer player, but Erika certainly did because she immediately straightened up, "What!?" she exclaimed directly looking at him now.

"And she asked whether we want to go watch the New Tokyo Rosa's practice." Erika gasped with her eyes now wide.

"NO WAY!" Shou, Reika and I desperately covered out ears.

"You're even louder than he is." I mumbled and Shou nodded in agreement however it all but deterred Erika, who was going on a rant about how Shou had no tact, which he didn't, while she flailed her arms around. It was kinda funny.

"I told her were going. You want me to cancel?" That was the wrong thing to say because she immediately got in his face and loudly stated that they were going. Reika looked pleased at the situation while I on the other hand wished that they would stop shouting so much. Seriously my ears.

"Do you wanna come, Yumi-san?"

 _'Again with the weird questions.'_

"Come to watch the practice with you?" Shou nodded eagerly at me. "Yumi-chan, I didn't know you liked soccer?" Erika looked at me with hopeful eyes. Please no, don't make me come with.

 _'Quick, think of an excuse!'_

"Um...I..uh..."

 _'And I'm a failure.'_

Now it was Saturday morning and guess what I was doing? Sitting on a train with Erika and Shou. That's right, I was forced into coming long, well kind of. I couldn't come up with a good enough excuse not to go, I had no piano lessons and delivering papers finished early enough for me to make it, so Erika and Shou ganged up on me to join them, yay. Note the sarcasm.

 _'Why me? I don't even play soccer,'_ sighing heavily I noticed Shou had dozed of and Erika was lost in her thoughts. She looked frustrated at something which got me a little curious but I wasn't about to ask.

They were both ecstatic when we got to the training grounds. _'Yay for them.'_ They were even admiring the artificial turf. _'Weirdos.'_

"You're here!" A woman with brown hair was walking up to us, probably this Misaki person, my suspicion was confirmed when they shouted a greeting back at her.

"And you brought a friend?" She was looking at me, probably wondering what I was doing here seeing as I wasn't wearing any sports gear like Erika and Shou were. "I'm Shimakage Yumi and they dragged me here," I pointed at the culprits. Misaki laughed and told us that they might allow Shou and Erika to play with them which Shou admitted that was what he wanted and Erika scolded him for being tactless again.

Misaki laughed, "Of course. Especially you." Erika looked back at her with confusion on her face. Interesting, now why she say something like that. Did I miss something again? Probably.

We were sitting on a bench next to the field while watching the teams warm up and even I could tell that they were good. I mean this is a national team right, you'd have to at least be good to get here. Erika looked troubled though. Might have something to do with whatever Misaki was implying earlier. My best guess was that she was realizing the difference in her skill level compared to theirs. _'Of course its different, dummy. Just don't let it discourage you. Make it your goal to get where they are.'_ Maybe I should say something to her.

Right as I was about to, she turned and asked Shou why he had asked to come today. He replied that he just wanted to thank Misaki but she invited him to come instead and he was told to bring Erika along. Erika glanced down looking even more troubled.

 _'Wait just a minute...then why am I here!'_

I didn't get a chance to ask because the practice match had begun. Misaki was now dribbling the ball up the field while looking around. She performed an evasive maneuver before having the ball stolen from her, "A Marseille Roulette." I said softly but I knew they both heard me because Erika frantically replied, "But she's surrounded!"

"No." I glanced at Shou, _'So he saw it then.'_ A different player had managed to stay open on the side corner of the field and caught the pass Misaki sent her, only to kick the ball in a parallel line towards the goal. A Girasols player looked confident that she would be able to divert the ball but failed to notice that Misaki had come up behind her and head-butted the ball into to the goal. Erika and Shou both cheered while I let out a small smile. Even I have to admit that it was pretty good, for a soccer game.

After the game Misaki came up to us and proceeded to ask Erika what the difference between the teams were. Erika replied, "Their skill," that's not entirely true, "Ball-tapping, speed, accuracy and pinpoint passing," she finished. I'm beginning to get why Misaki asked Shou to bring Erika here.

"I don't think so at all," Misaki, Shou and I stated at the same time. Erika looked at us confused, Misaki glanced at me curiously and Shou smiled at me and nodded for me to continue, "Um..well, the senior team and the youth team have equal passing strengths may be a bit different, but the main difference lies in the confidence."I trailed off quietly while looking down to hide my small blush with my bangs, this felt awkward. Misaki looked pleasantly surprised and smiled at me.

Erika didn't seem to get it, "What do you mean?" I looked at Shou and he took this as his cue to continue, "The Rosas have a wider field of vision." He emphasized with gesturing, "They can see their teammates' movements. So they can tell when the defensive switches are coming. That's the difference, right Yumi-san?"

I only nodded. I really wasn't used to this much talking. If you haven't noticed, I'm fairly quiet.

While Erika contemplated what was just said, Misaki had gone to convince the coach to let Erika and Shou play. She succeeded. She looked at me but I shook my head.

 _'No way, no how. Absolutely not.'_

Erika looked nervous and I understood why, she was doubting her skills, this would definitely teach her something valuable and hopefully she'd figure it out quickly.

"So, I'm guessing you don't play soccer then." I looked up to see Misaki and the coach standing next to me. I was wondering when she was going to ask about my presence, I simply shook my head. She gave me a pointed look, guess I have to elaborate, "Um...well..you see," well that was a lame start.

"I'm not good at sports, like at all. I did try out for many including soccer and I...uh sort of thought that if I knew a lot about it that it might help me and since I have an eidetic memory, remembering stuff isn't all that hard for me but it really didn't help since I have no hand-eye-coordination whatsoever." I glanced down nervously while tugging at the sleeves of my hoodie, "Its alright though because I found my passion for music. Shou-kun knows about my memory and often asks me to watch him practice and give him pointers but I really don't see how it could be helpful because I can't really show hi-" Misaki was giggling a bit and I realized that I was rambling.

 _'Whoops.'_

I was blushing now too, joy. "A-anyway he asked me to come and I didn't have good enough excuse not to, so yeah." That was awkward. She smiled though, "Well you have quite the eye for it though, at least for someone who doesn't play. Its impressive."

"T-t-thank y-you" Why was stuttering?

Anyway back to the match. It started out bad. Like really bad. The Girasols already scored and were leading score wise, Erika looked even more dis-heartened. _'Snap out of it, dummy.'_ Shou tried to intervene in a pass but missed, _'He tried though, he's doing his best.'_ At one point Shou used that loud voice of his call out to the players and Erika seemed gain back her determination and confidence. About time too cause I was about to head out there and slap some sense into her myself. The game ended in a tie. _'Good for them but WHY AM I EVEN HERE!'_ I sighed heavily.

Misaki seemed satisfied with how everything turned out and after some weird boy came over to us and asked Shou if the Furuyas were here because he wanted to play against them, we were back on the train. Shou had fallen asleep and Erika looked like she was reminiscing about how the day turned out. Me? Well I still hadn't found out why I was here in the first place.

"They're the core of the Predators" So she asked about the triplets. Glad I'm not totally lost this time. Score one for Yumi!

"They're also known as the Demon Triplets," might as well add to the conversation for once, Erika looked over to me with disbelief, "Demon Triplets?"

Shou carried on, "They're really good, but their personalities..." he trailed of nervously.

 _'Yeah they can be a bit off putting'_

"They got into a fight with the coach and left the team last winter." Erika adopted a thinking pose after hearing this. _'I don't like where this going.'_

"The manager got pissed of and the coach got fired" Shou went on to explain the rest while Erika still had a thoughtful look on her face and started counting her fingers. _'I really hope she's not thinking what I think she is.'_ I was proven right when she said that they'd only need three more players with the triplets. Shou looked at her and adopted the same thinking pose, _'Here we go.'_

"Why am I even here?" I grumbled out as we stood outside the Furuya home. Shou was talking to the intercom and Erika seemed to not have heard me because she was too busy gawking at the house. "They're at the park, it seems." Shou said and I ,at this point, tried to sneak away. I would have been successful too if Erika hadn't grabbed my wrist and started dragging me with her.

"You know this is considered kidnapping?" They blatantly ignored me and that caused me to sigh heavily, again. I was doing it a lot today.

 _'Why me?'_

And there they were, all three brothers, standing in a triangle shape while passing a tennis ball to each other without it ever touching the ground. Pretty impressive if you ask me.

Ryuuji seemed to notice us first, "Yo, isn't that Shou-kun?"

"Hey, long time no see. I have something to tell you three." Shou replied nervously while they just carried on hitting the ball, Erika looked slightly annoyed and I was trying my best to not get noticed. What if they recognized from last week. _'Don't be silly Yumi, they've probably completely forgotten about you.'_ That thought however was almost immediately shut down.

"Hey, isn't that the little mouse from before too?" Ozou said with a small smirk and the other two threw a glance in my direction. Erika and Shou did the same but said nothing.

 _'Dammit, they remembered.'_ From the heat spreading across my face I knew that I was once again blushing but hopefully my bangs hid most of it, hopefully. And what did he mean by little mouse? I wasn't that short, okay maybe I was barely even as tall as Shou but still.

"Can't you tell? We're in the middle of tennis practice." Ryuuji grabbed everyone's attention off of me and I released a breath I didn't know I was holding. That was intense.

"Can't you just hear us out?" Us? There was no us! It was you and Erika, I was kidnapped! I glanced over at Erika and she was starting to look really annoyed, 'Uh oh, this will not end well.'

"Shut up! You're disturbing us!" Ozou spoke harshly, looking thoroughly bothered by our presence. Erika's eyebrow twitched, _'Don't do it, don't do it.'_ My mental mantra didn't seem to get through to her as she grabbed the ball and kicked it at Ozou while shouting, "What's with that attitude!?"

 _'And you scolded Shou for being tactless.'_

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 ** _AND...its a cliff-hanger._**

 ** _Thanks again for reading._**

 ** _Please comment/review and let me know what you think._**

 **Would love to hear form you.**


	4. The Demon Triplets

**Hey back with chapter four, whoo! I don't think anyone's reading this T.T**

 **Please comment/review to let me know what you think.**

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That ball, that Erika had kicked in a rage at the Furuyas' attitude, may as well have been on fire due to the force and intention behind it.

 _'And you scolded Shou for being tactless.'_

The ball was aimed directly at Ozou's back but it never hit because he kicked it up into the air, very impressive.

 _'Focus.'_

"Not a bad shot for a girl."

When it came to about Kota's waist, he dropped his tennis racket and kicked the ball back with a greater force back at Erika. It was clearly in retaliation to her shooting the ball at Ozou's back.

Erika got a terrified look on her face knowing that she wouldn't be able to stop it and I moved slightly away from her, I sure as hell couldn't do it, but before it could hit her, Shou had moved in front of her essentially taking the full brunt of it. "Shou-kun!"

 _'Ouch, that's gonna leave a mark.'_ The force of wind that had come from the ball, easily blew my bangs out of the way and exposed my blue eyes. They were a force to be reckoned with and they knew it from the intimidating aura all three of them were now emitting.

 _'Scary.'_

Erika went to retaliate but Shou stopped her, "I'm fine." Good thing too, she would have only made it worse. He winced a little and I gave him a concerned look but he shook his head.

They were in front of us now and Shou addressed them, "Sorry for getting in the way of your tennis practice," he said with a smile as if the incident never happened, "But Kota-kun your kick was amazing. Playing tennis is such a waste. You should be playing soccer, right?"

It was rather impressive. _'Dammit Yumi! Focus.'_

"Is that what you came here for?" Ryuuji clearly looked amused.

"We won't be playing under that terrible coach." Ozou looked equally amused, "Right, Kota." Kota nodded with a small smile, a very small smile.

I thought I saw them throwing me a quick glance but disregarded it. Probably just my imagination. _'Now is not the time.'_

"No!" Shou was being loud again, "We're trying to create a new team, and we want to recruit the three of you." Straight to the point I see.

"We?" Ryuuji asked.

"Yes! Me, Erika-chan and Yumi-san." Shou replies with a proud look on his face.

 _'Wait a minute...since when was I a part of your team? I can't play. What the hell ere you thinking and WHEN WERE YOU GOING TO TELL ME ABOUT THIS!'_

"Let me introduce them," he pointed at Erika, "This is Takatou Erika-chan. She played soccer on a girls' team in Osaka." He then pointed at me, "And that is Shimakage Yumi-san. She's going to be the assistant coach." Where in heaven's name did he get this idea from?

 _'I'm going to kill him,'_ I glared at him but he didn't notice because Ozou had begun to reply, "Oh? We're playing not only with a girl but being coached by the little mouse." The way he said it with a mocking tone, was intentionally meant to offend us but I was too busy glaring at Shou to care.

Erika took the bait however and looked very clearly offended, "Ozou-kun, didn't you say that her shot was pretty good for a girl?" Shou defended.

"I guess," he complied.

Shou continued, "Erika-chan's a lot better than me." She grumbled out something that sounded like obviously but I think he ignored it, "How about it? Won't you join our team?" Its not our team, its your team, I was getting more and more irritated as he went on, "We can play games with New Tokyo FC Rosa's feeder teams."

"Rosa? The team in the Nadeshiko League?" Ryuuji inquired. I think they're starting to warm up to it.

"I know Shimizu Misaki, a player on Rosa. She told me to form my team." That's right, your team, a team where some of the members weren't informed that they were members.

"Feeder teams?" Yep, they were warming up to it.

"Female youth teams."

"Well.."Kota spoke for the first time through out this conversation. _'You haven't exactly spoken yet either, Yumi,'_ I was working on it.

Erika didn't seem too happy with the way he said it, "What's with that?"

Ryuuji was the one who responded, "Kota-kun is saying that there's not much point in this." Okay maybe they aren't warming up to it, "We should be playing Rosa, the top team." Never mind, they so are.

"We can!" Shou looked even more excited and they looked at him confused. "If we beat the feeder teams, we can play Rosa!" This definitely got their attention. Shou's won this battle.

"Really?" Ryuuji asked and Shou was all too happy to reply, "Yep! They'll let us play if we win." Erika looked to the side slightly annoyed, they had after all wounded her pride.

"Lets do it, then," we all looked at Kota with both shocked and confused expressions. He must like the idea then. The other two immediately agreed after that.

"If that's what Kota-kun wants." Ryuugi complied.

Ozou continued, "That's right. A top-flight women's team sounds like an interesting opponent." Erika grumbled of to the side and I couldn't help but snicker quietly at her. She was never gonna get over it.

"Yes! Now we have five players and an assistant coach!" Oh that's right, I forgot about that little fact. Thank you for reminding me Shou.

 _'I'm going to kill him.'_

"Oh yeah. Erika-chan, Yumi-san, let me introduce them properly." Shou began the introduction, starting with Kota, then Ryuuji and ending with Ozou.

When he finished, Erika gawked at the three of them, "They do look alike."

 _'No duh, they're triplets you dummy'_ Yes, I was mentally taking it out on her.

"So the little mouse doesn't play then?" What was with Ozou calling me that, I'm not a mouse. The other two were looking at me as well and I could see amusement in their eyes.

Erika and Shou looked at me for the first time since we got here and only then seemed to notice the deadly aura surrounding me and of course the icy glare I was giving them. Erika's face paled a bit but Shou looked terrified, as he should, and took a few steps away from me.

 _'Be afraid, be very afraid.'_

"Um...Yumi-san," Shou had a nervous expression on his face, "did I forget to mention it you?" He laughed equally as nervous.

"What?!" Erika's loud exclamation only irritated me more, "You never asked her? You really have no tact when it comes to these things!" I'm getting a head-ache.

"Shut up." It came out quietly but still made them both fall silent, the triplets seemed even more amused. _'Glad you find this funny.'_ I thought bitterly.

I grabbed both Shou and Erika by the ear which made them wince because I may have tugged a bit too hard. Not on purpose though, well maybe not completely. "First of all will you two stop with all of the yelling, you're giving me a head-ache. Secondly, Shou you don't get to decide who becomes an assistant coach, the manager and the actual coach does, both of which you don't have at the moment," I tugged a little harder on his ear to get the next point across, "Third and foremost, don't go deciding things without asking me first!" And I released them and they both rubbed their abused ears, serves them right.

"So the mouse can become a kitten," I looked over at Ozou, "It seems like it," Ryuuji agreed and Kota nodded. I blushed bright red.

 _'I got so into it that I forgot they were even here. And why does he keep saying that?'_

While trying to regain my composure I noticed Shou started apologizing, "Sorry, Yumi-san. I got so excited about it all that I forgot to ask you." I nodded in acceptance, "Don't worry, when we get a coach, I'm sure they'll be happy to make you an assistant coach." He beamed at me.

 _'What just happened?'_

Before I could voice my confusion, Ryuuji brought back the conversation back to the matter at hand.

 _'Why does this keep happening to me?'_

"We only have five people here that plays? What do we do for the remaining six?" Shou probably has a solution for that and I was once again proven correct when he replied, "Just eight is fine, so we need three more. I have just the three."

It was late afternoon when we found them, the 3Us.

"The 3Us?" Ozou questioned, Erika looked confused about the title and Shou quickly explained. It was Uchimura Kei, Uematsu Tarou and Ukishima Yuuto. Their last names ending in the letter 'u' resulted in the nickname, 3U. As far as I'm aware they all had quit because of having to study for exams.

"Those three will do, I guess," Ryuuji said as he took the soccer ball and with great accuracy kicked it so that it landed on top of the ball the 3Us were using, again impressive. It got their attention and the triplets raced down the stairs to speak with them. Also impressive seeing as I would have tripped and most likely end up killing myself if I tried that.

Erika looked impressed too, "Those three are pretty good."

"See?" Shou boasted with a closed eyed grin.

"But is it really okay to leave it to the three of them?" Looks like she doubted their social skills seeing as her first encounter with them was anything but pleasant.

I decided to ease her worrying, "Don't worry, they'll listen to them." I said softly and Shou nodded in agreement. Erika praised Shou's strategy in gaining members through the triplets.

As predicted they had agreed and now everyone was standing in this sort of huddle, Erika and Shou on one side while the triplets and the 3Us were on the other side in a half circle. I was standing a little bit away from them, behind Shou and Erika. It really had nothing to do with me so I didn't bother getting any closer but I could still hear everything.

 _'Why don't I just leave, they don't need me.'_ I thought but the curiosity of how this would turn out got the better of me.

"Thank you, everyone!" Shou began, "Now that all of you are here, the new team is born. Thank you again!" He finished looking very satisfied with this outcome.

"Can we really play against Rosa," Uchimura questioned.

"If we beat the youth teams." Shou clarified.

Ryuuji corrected,"We will." Well he seems confident.

Erika seemed to have the same thought, "You make it sound so simple."

"Of course we need proper training. If we can't play against Rosa, there's no point in making this team." His brothers agreed with him and Shou made arrangements for them to train tomorrow and that he would find a team to have a practice match against. Then they proceeded choose Dandelion, which Erika had suggested, as the name of their team and she seemed pretty chirpy about it.

 _'Yeah, I'm just gonna go home now. No point in staying anymore.'_ I turned around and started to walk away but was, yet again, stopped by a hand holding onto my left wrist. I turned around to see it was Shou, the others were looking at the interaction curiously and for a moment I thought I saw the Furuyas give Shou a small glare. Must be imagining things again.

'Now what?' Shou seemed to hear my mental question, "Please Yumi-san," I was startled by the determination in his voice and tilted my to the side in question, looking at him with only my left eye visible, he continued, "Please stay and watch us!"

Everyone looked surprised at how serious he was being, even I was.

 _'But I need to know...'_

"Why?" I voiced softly but loud enough for everyone to hear me. Shou let go of my wrist, "Because your eyes are better than mine," he's gonna have to better than that, "you would be able see more than I would while we're practicing or playing in a match. I can't watch everyone all of the time and you might be able to see something that I can't, it'll only be until we find a real coach, I promise and if you want to leave after that, I won't stop you." Everyone was looking at me curiously in order to see what my decision would be and I knew that with Shou's persistence, he wouldn't let it go easily.

 _'I'm going to regret this.'_

"Just don't cry when I tell you how bad you are at soccer, Shou-kun." He sweat-dropped and everyone else laughed slightly, "Thank you, Yumi-san."

On Monday Reika asked about the team and Erika explained how everything went. Ukishima was the goalkeeper, Shou and Ouzou were the defenders, Ryuuji and Uematsu were the midfielders and Kota, Uchimura and Erika were the forwards.

She was clearly excited that they were able to pick the positions themselves and how much they'd done without having a coach.

"That's great." Reika praised and Erika enthusiastically agreed, "Yep! Those triplets may seem a bit cocky, but their skills are for real."

It turned out that I couldn't make it because my piano lesson had gone longer than expected. My piano teacher, Imagawa Sachi, reminded me that I had a piano recital coming up and we had to decide which pieces I was going to perform. Hence I skipped yesterday's practice, Shou didn't seem to mind when I called his house afterwards to apologize.

"You're still eating." Speak of the devil. Shou proceeded explained how he went and asked the neighboring middle school's team for a practice match which immediately got him trouble because he went off of campus on his own again. Yeah, it happened a lot.

"A match with middle schoolers?"

We were all sitting on the steps near the park except for Shou and Ryuuji who were standing at the bottom looking up at us. "But they'll be pretty big," Uchimura sounded hesitant.

"Thats why we asked them." Ryuuji cleared up.

"Why?" Erika asked and Ryuuji humored her, "We are aiming to play against the top-flight Rosa."

"In other words, against adults," everyone looked up towards me, I was sitting two steps in front of Kota next to Erika. "They may be women, but they have the physical upper hand against you. That's why you're practicing against middle schoolers." I finished and Ryuuji looked impressed but it was the hand patting my head that caught my attention. I looked to see that it was Kota's hand.

 _'Huh?'_ He withdrew it and acted as if it never happened. Weird and I saw Erika giving me a knowing glance.

'Don't go getting any ideas.'

Shou told us that the match was one week away and that got everyone, mostly Erika, concerned but Ryuuji quickly calmed them by saying he had something to show us while holding up a CD.

Turns out it was a recording of the Rosas playing a match against an American team. I ,for some strange reason, lost focus and completely zoned out while it was playing but found out that the next practice session was going to be focused on passing and counterattacking.

And that was exactly what they did. I had arrived a little late because of piano lessons only to see that Erika had the ball, Ozou was blocking her and Ryuuji was behind her. _'She's not paying attention to the others.'_ When she tried to get around him, Ozou knocked her over.

"Erika-chan, that pass came out too slowly!" Shou told her but she, yet again, looked confused, "But I had no passing lanes!"

"Ryuuji was behind you," I said, making my presence known.

"Yumi-san! You're here!" I nodded at Shou's greeting but kept my covered eyes on Erika, "Pay attention to your team members, dummy." So I wasn't a sugar-coating type of person, sue me.

Ryuuji elaborated on my instruction, Shou gave some advice and Erika told them to shut up and eclaimed that she would keep her eyes wide open. It was her way of saying 'thank you.' I think she needs to work on it.

After the successful match against the middle schoolers, we ended up back a the Rosa training grounds.

"Thank you very much." We were standing in front of Misaki and she looked happy to see us even though she seemed a little nervous at being stared at by the triplets. It could be unnerving at first, I guess.

I yawned and sat down leaning against the fence. I gave the team a not-so-enthusiastic thumbs up and couldn't help but yawn again.

The reason for my tiredness was because I had stayed up late last night to look at different piano pieces for my recital, I had top play two pieces and I ended up losing track of time. I also had to do my paper route in the morning so in short I didn't get much sleep.

Someone was shaking me, "Oi, you need to wake up." When did I fall asleep? I slowly opened my eyes to see the triplets, Ozou was crouching in front of me, he was the one that shook me, Ryuuji was on the left with an amused smile on his face and Kota was on the right with his usual blank look but I could see the corners of his mouth tilting up ever so slightly.

"Huh?" Real intelligent of me I know, but hey, I just woke up.

Ozou smirked, "We're about to play against Rosa." How long had I been asleep?

'Whoops.' I felt guilty now, not very good coach am I? Falling asleep during a game.

"Don't worry, those matches weren't important. We just need you to watch this one." Ryuuji calmed my guilty thoughts and Kota nodded. Ozou patted my head, "Try not fall asleep during this one, okay little mouse." I could only nod while trying to control my blushing.

 _'Again with the patting and little mouse thing.'_

The score was 13-12 to the Dandelions in the end and it was a tough match. The triplets had tried to this thing where they all adopted the same hairstyle in order to try and trick the Rosa players. It was pretty cool. Misaki congratulated them on the good game and I gave another thumbs up.

We were now sitting on the train heading back home. Shou was standing while the rest of us were sitting. He was ranting about how exciting the day had gone and I was trying my hardest not fall asleep again. Ryuuji patted my head and smiled at my efforts but I was too tired to question why.

Shou was really excited at the thought of finding three more players and becoming the best in the country but unfortunately he was shot down by Ryuuji first, "We never said that we were going to keep on playing. We have achieved our goal. That's the end of our soccer, for now."

"It was pretty fun," Ozou followed, "Later."

I looked up at them as they passed me. "See you later, little mouse." Ozou patted my head, "Get some rest, and take care of yourself better, its not healthy to miss out on sleep." Ryuuji patted my head. Kota simply nodded while he patting my head. Then they were gone.

 _'What is with all the head patting today?'_

Shou looked even more discouraged when the 3Us also left saying that they had to get back to focusing on their studies. Erika left quickly after that and Shou looked at me.

"What now Yumi-san?" He sighed looking irritated because of being left alone again. It was kinda funny.

"Do what you do best Shou-kun, annoy them until they give in." I walked away before he could respond.

 _'I'm going to regret saying that later.'_

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 **And that's chapter four.**

 **Thank you for reading :)**

 **Have a great day**


	5. Lightning Light

**Hey so here's chapter five. Yay!**

 **I tried to put a little more interaction between Yumi and the triplets in this one.**

 **Let me know what you think :)**

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And it was yet again another school day, filled with all the joys that came with it. Which ,in my case, was none. Yep, I was having none of the joy.

You see, my piano teacher, Imagawa Sachi, had finally decided which pieces I would be performing for my recital that was a little later in the year. It would be the Fur Elise by Beethoven and the Alla Turca by Mozart. I know, pretty complicated pieces but has confidence that I can do it, it just required A LOT of practice. Like a lot, a lot.

Not to worry though, since the recital was only later in the year, we have plenty of time to prepare but I'm still a little nervous about it. So with my mind occupied, I kinda may have slightly zoned everything out, again.

Anyway, seeing as I was so caught in my thoughts I had absolutely no idea how I got to this point. Not even sure how I got outside really.

Apparently Shou had asked, more like begged, Erika to come back to the team. They then decided that they would have a heading contest, if Shou won Erika would come back but if Erika won, Shou would give up asking her. Erika won obviously, she had more experience, Shou tried to get a rematch but she said that she was going to try and join the Kawahara International Heavens team. Shou looked pretty disappointed.

And that was it. Shou said something about going to the park after school to practice heading and asked if I wanted to watch but I told him that I had piano lessons, which I did.

"Again."

I complied to 's demand and played the Fur Elise again. I was going alright but I would often trip over my fingers every now and again, especially when it came to the Alla Turca.

"Focus Yumi, you need to pay full attention to what you're doing." I winced at that. Yes, I was a little distracted again and guess what it was about. It was about Shou's current predicament. Despite what you may think, I actually feel sorry for him. I mean, here he was trying his hardest to succeed in getting a team together only to have it sort of thrown back in his face.

 _'Poor Shou.'_

When I finished the piece Mr. Imagawa told me to try and practice at home but not to strain myself since my hands and wrists weren't used to the fast pace movement of either pieces. He warned me not to stress my joints and to stop whenever I felt them hurting.

He also gave me a lengthy lecture about staying focused.

It was early afternoon when the lesson finished so I didn't feel like walking particularly fast to get home. I was still kinda thinking about the team. Erika would only join if there was an actual coach and I guess the Furuyas would too if the coach was good in their eyes. Someone like that was gonna be hard to find though.

 _'Speaking of the Furuyas. What exactly was up with the head patting and the little mouse thing?!'_

Yeah, I still hadn't figured it out, I mean, I know that those gestures have some sort of affection or meaning behind them but why me? You'd think their attention would land on someone who could actually kick a ball instead of tripping over it. Not on someone like me, an athletically and sometimes socially challenged person who does in fact trip over anything and everything

 _'It makes no sense!'_

I was so busy thinking about it that I didn't even notice someone standing in front of me until I walked right into them.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I wasn't..." I looked up while apologizing only to see that was none other than the three people who had occupied my mind just a few seconds ago.

There they were, standing in front of me, all looking equally amused. "You should pay more attention, Yumi-chan." Ryuuji was the one I'd walked into," You could hurt yourself if you don't look where you're going." He reprimanded with a smile on his face.

Ryuuji was definitely the calm one of the group but don't be fooled he was known for being exceedingly smart and using it to his advantage.

And cue the awkward turtle syndrome, "Um...I...I w-was a l-l-little b-bit dist-distracted th-there." I winced at my horrible attempt at forming words.

Ozou chuckled,"No need to be so nervous, little mouse. We won't bite...," his famous smirk appeared on his face,"...hard, that is." I was blushing at this point.

Ozou was the more laid back one of the three and seemed to enjoy teasing me.

I felt a hand on my head and saw that it was Kota's. "Kota-kun says that you shouldn't tease her so much, Ozou-kun." Ryuuji spoke for him,"You might scare her away." Kota nodded and removed his hand.

Kota was more of a 'talk less and do more' kind of person but he was very passionate about soccer as far I could tell.

"Fine, fine. I'll restrain myself but I don't know if I'll be able to if she keeps making those kinds of faces." What does he mean by that? Was I making a face while walking over here? Probably.

Ryuuji grabbed my attention again,"What were you thinking about that made you so distracted, Yumi-chan?"

 _'Crap! You most definitely can't tell them that you were thinking about the three of them.'_

"Um...I..um."

 _'Come on Yumi! You can do it. Just say something.'_

"Um...I..f-f-forgot?" I looked down so that I could hide steadily spreading blush that was forming across my face.

 _'Dammit!'_

I felt a hand under my chin, lifting my head up and another hand brushing my bangs out of my face.

"Don't hide your face, Yu." Kota said as his hand continued brushing the hair away from my eyes while Ozou removed his hand from under my chin and continued speaking, "We rather enjoy watching your reactions." He smirked and Kota finally stopped brushing my hair. "So try not to hide from us and also please be careful. We wouldn't want you to get hurt." Ryuuji finished as they all patted my head and left me standing there with my face as red as a tomato.

 _'What the hell was that!?'_

It took me full five minutes to recover from that experience enough to stumble my way home. To say that I was confused would be the understatement of the century.

I barely noticed Shou practice heading with this dude I recognized as the local drunk that slept on the bench at the park every afternoon. Shou sure finds some strange people to play soccer with.

I had trouble falling asleep that night because I kept replaying the scenario with the triplets over and over in my head.

 _'What the actual HELL was that!?'_

I barely made it to school the next day but not because I had trouble falling asleep. The only time my mother would let me skip school was if I was severely injured or if I was dying of an illness. Okay maybe not dying but I had to be pretty sick for it to happen.

I wasn't sick though, so the only other option was an injury. It wasn't even my fault though.

You see I was walking to school, minding my own business, when this rather large kid in a black hoodie ran past me near the park. And it wasn't the normal 'I'll-try-not-to-run-anyone-over' while roaring past them kind of thing. No, it was a full on 'get-out-of-the-way-or-die' kind of thing. And me being the overly-uncoordinated person that I am, tried to get out of the way but sort of fell out of the way instead and rolled down the hill that led down to the park, obtaining a few scratches and bruises along the way but somehow I landed on my ankle in a rather painful way. I was not impressed to say the least.

"You're lucky you only obtained minor injuries on top of the sprain to your ankle, Shimakage-chan." The doctor had finished bandaging my ankle and to some of the scratches on my arms and legs. "I'll give you some crutches, so make sure you keep off of your ankle for at least a week." He finished and my mother, who had rushed over to the clinic upon receiving a call from the receptionist and went on a rant about how she would murder the twerp who had done this to her baby, got the crutches and helped me into her car. Yeah I inherited the over-dramatic thing from her.

She was calm by the time we left and drove me to school, like I said, I had to practically be dying to be allowed to skip school.

I only missed one class so nothing to be really worried about, not that I'd worry about something like that, I could easily catch up later.

Reika immediately asked if I was alright. _'She's so nice.'_ While Erika practically interrogated me for information.

"Yumi-chan, what happened? Where you in an accident? Did someone hurt you? I can beat them up for you, just tell me who did it." She was in my face now and it was hard enough to keep my balance while standing on my own two feet but with the crutches it was practically impossible.

"Um..its fine," I began weakly,"I...uh sort of got bulldozed out of the way while walking past the park this morning and fell down the hill." I laughed nervously and Erika looked at me bewildered.

"Bulldozed?" Oh great I have to elaborate, "Um, yeah well you see.." and I explained what happened this morning, all be it a bit awkwardly.

She kinda let it go, sort of. I mean after ranting about how rude it was to simply plow people over just because you had to get somewhere quickly and saying that she would have given them a piece of her mind, I think she let it go.

"What happened to you Yumi-san!?" And now I had to explain to Shou who took it a lot more calmly, surprisingly enough, than Erika did. "As long as you're okay then." He smiled at me and I nodded, my bangs covering my eyes. This was a little bit embarrassing.

"Hey Yumi-san, do want to come check out the amazing coach I found yesterday?" You mean the drunkard? As a coach? Well he seemed to be quite skilled so maybe he could be qualified for it.

I debated and figured that Shou wouldn't simply take 'no' for an answer and Erika was practically begging by the look in her eyes.

 _'Here we go again.'_

Erika and I both sweat-dropped at Masaru, the drunkard, who was asleep on his usual park bench while Shou tried to wake him up. "Uncle! Wake up! Uncle!

 _'Why did he have to take up the whole bench? I'm tired after limping with the crutches all the way here.'_

"He looks like any old drunkard." Erika put her hands on her hips and Zach made a noise in agreement.

"No but yesterday..." Shou was interupted by two guys running up the nearby stairs.

"Wait right there!" a large boy wearing a black hoodie ran up after them, "Stop running away!" Managed to grab the back of their shirts.

 _'Isn't he the guy who ran me over?'_

I moved back slight with my crutches, just in case, I didn't feel like having a repeat of this morning.

The two boys he had grabbed protested about not wanting to do something. "Suguro-kun!" How the hell does Shou this oaf.

"You're Suguro-kun from Tsubaki Forest FC, right?" Figures that's how he'd know who this dude was.

Suguro gained a look of recognition on his face, "You're from the Predators.." he dropped the two he was holding and they all too quickly made it their chance to escape. "There's a lot of things I need to tell you!" He took a menacing step towards Shou.

However, Ryuuji appeared out of nowhere, effectively stopping him from whatever he intended to do, "Please stop that. He's my former teammate."

Erika pointed out the other two," Oh, it's the Furuyas."

 _'Why them of all people.'_ I mentally whined and hoped they wouldn't spot me. I was still unnerved about what happened yesterday.

 _'Please don't see me, please don't see me.'_

Ozou acknowledged them," Isn't this Shou and Takatou?" Kota nodded.

 _'Yes! They haven't noticed me yet.'_

"What are you doing here?" Erika asked. A very good question indeed.

The bulldozer responded, "Who cares," he looked back at Ozou and Kota, " I heard you played a practice match against Rosa!" News travels fast I see, "You played with a professional team! Why aren't you coming back to soccer!?" He asked.

'Probably cause they're annoyed with your presence.' I glared at him with my right eye. Okay so I was being a little harsh but hey, I'm on crutches because of this guy.

"I thought I could challenge you three again!" Man he was loud too, great.

Ozou responded calmly," We were just playing around. We're free to choose whether we want to come back or not." His smirk was ever present on his face and the bulldozer seemed angrier now.

"Well, Suguro-kun is quite mad and wants to play 3v3 match but.." Ryuuiji started and Kota finished,"...they ran away."

The bulldozer looked around realizing that they were right and no I wasn't going to call him by his name anytime soon. "Shut up..," he looked at Shou and Erika, " You two! Form a team with me and let's go!" They both looked startled but agreed.

I just sighed, _'Well this is gonna take longer than I thought.'_

"Yumi-chan, can hold Zach's leash for me?" I groaned internally because now three pairs of red eyes zoned in on me and obviously noticed the crutches plus the scratches and bruises.

 _'Dammit.'_ I sighed. The triplets narrowed their eyes in question, "I-I'll tell y-you all later." I said quietly in order for them to stop assessing me and go play the match. They nodded in agreement.

I managed to sit on the ground next to Zach since Masaru was still snoring on the bench. Ryuuji explained the rules and Shou looked at Masaru hopefully. 'He wants him to wake up?' I tilted my head slightly. Zach licked Masaru's face, waking him up just as the match began. He turned on his side so that he could see it better.

As the game progressed Masaru sat up. _'He's getting interested.'_

Ryuuji pulled of a very impressive roulette and Masaru seemed even more interested.

"Not bad huh?" I commented and he glanced down at me, "Hmmm, for a brat I guess." Was his reply but I knew that he was most definitely hooked.

When Ryuuji scored a goal Masaru stumbled up towards Erika.

I hoped onto one leg trying to stop him, "Hey..um..you.." I couldn't finish because Shou called out to him, "Masaru-ojisan!"

"That's dangerous, old man." Erika warned and Ozou backed her up, a bit more rudely though, "Hey, old man. You're bothering us. Move aside." He could've said it a little nicer. I, on the other hand, was barely managing to stay standing on one foot and ended up jumping on the spot but it would only be a matter of time before I fell over.

Shou explained how Masaru was good at soccer which got Ozou and Ryuuji to ask him to join Shou's team since it made a little bit more fair.

'They really are cocky.' Just as I thought this my feet, well foot, suddenly left the ground and I looked up to see Kota carrying me, bridal-style. Cue extreme blushing, yep I was as red as a firetruck.

 _'What do I do!?'_

But before I could ask what he was doing, I was gently deposited on the bench. I looked up at Kota as he again brushed my bangs out of my face.

"I...uh.." I stumbled over my words, I had no clue what to say about this situation.

"Yu..," Kota's voice startled me out of my thoughts, "..stay." And he went back to the field.

I blinked, _'Did he just..'_ I blinked a few more times. _'..tell me to stay? Like a dog would?'_ I huffed and pouted slightly. Zach panted happily beside me and my pout increased.

 _'Why me?'_

The match ended with Masaru scoring an amazing goal while shouting something about him being the Lightning Light and then he promptly passed out.

 _'Well that went well.'_

This woman came up to him checked to see if he was okay but I was too busy looking at Kota who had a small smile on his face.

 _'He's excited about this...'_ I gave a small smile at seeing the look that was on his face while the others tried to help get Masaru up.

We ended up at Masaru's apartment. Everyone had pitched in to help Kyouko, a friend of Masaru's it turns out, drag said person back to his place. All except for me and Kota. Why you ask, well because Kota insisted that he give me piggy-back ride and Ryuuji held onto my crutches which meant I had no other choice but to comply. I pouted in protest and Ozou rubbed my head while chuckling at me.

I didn't think it was very funny.

"Thank you all for helping me out." Kyouko said after closing the curtains and sat down, "I can't carry this drunkard all by myself." She referred to the still snoring Masaru who was now sleeping in his bed.

I was sitting down next to Shou and Erika while the triplets were standing behind us. "Will he be okay?" Shou asked clearly concerned. Kyouko assured him that Masaru would be fine since he didn't move that much during their game. Which reminded of that kick, I'd seen it somewhere before and before I knew my mind was automatically racing to find where I had seen it.

Ozou was the first to ask, "Who is he, anyway?" Images were flashing through my mind at this point. "That shot was really amazing." Ryuuji added and Kyouko scratched her cheek nervously trying to find the right words but Shou interrupted her, "I want Hanashima-san to be our coach!" Erika quickly protested at him asking that so quickly.

I wasn't paying attention though because my eidetic memory had kicked into full gear when Shou said Masaru's last name. I now had a clear image of where I'd seen that kick. It was when I tried researching about soccer in hopes it might help me be able to play it on some level.

In the same room as us was none other than the Hanashima Masaru, who was player of the Chiba Thunderbolts, and was known as Lightning Light because of his powerful right foot shot. He was going to play in the J-league, but got an injury and retired from soccer. He also coached for the Thunderbolts' kids team but had stopped due to unknown circumstances.

We were outside the apartment building and Ozou was helping me down the stairs. Kota seemed distracted and I could only guess why. "Shou-kun, wait a second." Ryuuji began and Shou turned around to look at him, "If that old man becomes our coach, we'll return to the team."

Shou looked really happy and why wouldn't he be, it was the intention after all.

"That's what Kota-kun is thinking." Ryuuji said and Kota looked embarrassed, "I don't really mind." I couldn't help but giggle quietly at him.

 _'That was kinda cute.'_ Whoa there, where did that come from?

"Yumi-san, do you know anything about Hanashima-san?" I looked over to Shou and I tilted my head to the right a little, debating whether or not to tell him.

I decided to mess with him instead because it was more fun that way and smirked slightly, "We'll see," I walked/limped past them. I heard Shou protesting but I made no move to stop. It was kinda fun getting him all riled up.

I didn't manage to get very far, not only because I was on crutches but because the Furuyas were now blocking my way.

 _'Seriously! How do they do that!?'_

Ryuuji began speaking first, "I believe you said you'd explain how you ended up on crutches, Yumi-chan." He said with a frown on his face and the other two nodded looking equally serious about this. I had hoped they'd forgotten about that but I guess I'm not that lucky.

"W-well, y-you see,"

 _'Stop stuttering for goodness sake.'_

I gulped and inhaled a breath, "I-I was walking to school, minding my own business, when I saw some kid running at me full speed and since I'm not very coordinated I sort of fell out his way and ended up not only rolling down a hill but also spraining my ankle in process. Yeah I don't even know how I managed that but the doctor said that it isn't that bad of a sprain and that I should be able to walk properly again next week." There was no stopping me now, "Its not really a big deal because I'm very clumsy and I somehow end up hurting myself all the time so its really nothing new. This one ti-" I was stopped from my rambling by Kota's hand on my mouth.

 _'Oh dear.'_ I blushed bright red, again. Kota removed his hand and I noticed that were all, yet again, finding me very amusing for some reason.

Ozou was the first to recover, "Well, seems like we have to keep a close eye on you from now on, little mouse." He chuckled as he took my crutches away from me, "Ozou-kun is right. We should probably make sure you get home safely too." Ryuuji motioned for me to get on his back.

"Y-you re-really don't ha-" Kota interrupted me again, "Yu." I pouted but complied, the look on his face was enough for me to see that protesting was pointless.

And so they took me home and needless to say, I had even more trouble sleeping that night.

* * *

 **And that's chapter five. Whoo!**

 **Thank you so much for reading and please comment/review to let me know what you guys think.**


	6. Coach

**Firstly, thank you so much Daisuke Daichi for you feedback! (P.S. I couldn't figure our how to reply to your review so I thought I'd mention my appreciation here, so sorry for the late response.)**

 **Here's chapter six, hope you guys enjoy :)**

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Its way too early for this.

"This must be a fated meeting!" I could only sigh at Shou's enthusiasm. He was ranting about Hanashima and how he wanted him to be the coach for the team.

 _'Its way too early for him to be this happy.'_ Erika seemed to think the same thing because she was only answering Show with one word answers and yawning in between.

Apparently Shou had decided that they were going to visit Hanashima this morning before school to ask him to be their coach. They just happen to come upon me making my way to school as well. Mom had an early meeting to get to this morning and dad was still out of town so neither could take me to school. So I had no other choice but to limp my way to school on these stupid crutches. It was taking longer since I had to be extra careful not to trip on something.

"Erika-chan! Yumi-san!" Shou shout snapped us both wide awake.

Erika looked startled, "W-What?"

"Show some more enthusiasm!" Not gonna happen on my part, "This is about our team!"

"You're always way to early in the morning! Can't this stuff wait until after school?" Erika protested and I nodded in agreement, it wouldn't really make a difference either way because I had a feeling Hanashima was gonna say no.

It didn't deter him though, not much did, "I'll show him how serious I am by visiting him first thing in the morning!" His eyes seemed to light on fire from his determination.

 _'Well aren't you going to be disappointed then.'_ I thought snidely. What? It was way too early to be dealing with this.

We got to the apartment building, Shou rang the bell and then he proceeded to do what only Shou would do, yell unnecessarily loud.

"Good morning! Is anyone home!?"

Erika reprimanded him, "You're so loud, jeez! You're disturbing the neighbors!"

I gave her a deadpan look, _'You're not really one to talk.'_

Just then the door opened revealing a disheveled Hanashima, like he'd just gotten out of bed, which was probably the case.

Shou proceeded to greet him, "Good morning!" He smiled widely,"Um I'm here to ask you again! Please become our coach!" Hanashima just stared at him.

 _'This is not gonna work.'_

Shou continued, "You're really amazing Hanashima-san! I was really moved by that shot yesterday!" Erika agreed, "Yeah! That kick gave me goosebumps! Please be our coach!"

"What are you talking about?" Hanashima responded and both Shou and Erika looked confused. I just narrowed my eyes from behind my bangs. _'He's up to something._ '

Hanashima scratched his chin, "Was I drunk? I don't really remember." So that's how he was going to play this off, by pretending to not remember it. Erika and Shou both believed it and asked what he meant by that.

"Anyway, I refuse your offer. Please go home." And with that he shut the door. The two standing beside me looked very disappointed.

 _'But I wonder..'_

"Yumi-chan, aren't you coming?" I looked to see Erika and Shou had already descended the stairs and were waiting for me.

I shook my head, "Um, you guys go ahead. I wanna see something." They both glanced at each other and warned me not to be late while walking away. I could hear their chatter for a while but paid no mind to it really. I was too busy trying to decipher what just happened.

I knew that Hanashima loved soccer, the look on his face when he made that shot yesterday was enough to convince me of that, but why was he so resistant to the idea of coaching again? Did it have something to do with the Thunderbolts' kid team that he coached? What was it? Did something happen to one of the team members? That would be the only plausible reason for him to refuse, because he feels guilty about whatever happened.

 _'Why are you even trying to figure this out, Yumi? This has almost nothing to do with you, so why?'_

"Um did you need something?" I was snapped out of my contemplation by a familiar voice and turned around to see Kyouko behind me with a bag in her hand.

She was looking at me curiously, "Oh you're one of those kids from yesterday. Where are those handsome triplets? They seem to fuss over you quite a bit, something going on there?" She smiled mischievously at me and I blushed hoping my bangs hid most of it.

"N-N-no, th-there's n-nothing going on." I breathed heavily getting more flustered and she laughed at me. "If you say so~" That tone doesn't reassure me at all.

She then proceeded to knock on the door and it swung open with a great force while Hanashima shouted, "You're so annoying!" Before he could continue Kyouko shoved the bag in his face, "Here, time for breakfast." She smiled at his bewildered expression.

He seemed to notice me standing next to her and frowned, "Look, I already told you. I don't-"

"Its rude to lie you know." I said with interrupting him, "And resisting against Shou is pretty pointless. No matter what the reason is, he's just going to keep coming back until you agree to become the coach." He looked like he was going to say something but I carried on, "I'm sorry for sounding a bit rude but," I took a hesitant breath, "..if you don't stop holding onto the whatever is keeping you from doing something that you love then," I looked him straight at him with both of my eyes uncovered, "you'll never get anywhere and most likely end up dying a miserable old man with far too many regrets." He looked shocked, "Besides, I think that you're allowed to be happy."

And with that I left as fast as my crutches would carry me. _'Why did you do that? You dummy, that was way out of line! You don't even know him or his situation and you just came out and said it like that!'_ I looked down slightly ashamed at myself. After all, saying things like that to someone you don't know is considered rude but it was like my mouth had a mind of it own and I couldn't stop myself.

I sighed, _'I guess I'll apologize if I see him again.'_

I somehow caught up to Erika, Shou and Reika. Wonder where she came from? Anyway they were trying to figure out how to get Hanashima to become their coach with various sorts of methods, none of them promising though.

After school I had separated from Erika and Shou who were again going to Hanashima's apartment to ask him if he would be their coach. I really wasn't in the mood to see him again, especially after this morning.

But as luck would have it I stumbled upon him in the park, drinking as usual.

 _'I'm an idiot.'_ He looked over at me as that thought left my mind.

I was about to turn around and leave but he stopped me, "Wait," I looked at him as he scooted over, "..sit down for a second." I hesitantly limped my way over. _'He's probably going to yell at me.'_ I gulped, _'Why did you have to open your big mouth Yumi.'_

We sat in silence for a few awkward seconds.

"Um..I'm s-sorr-"

"Why did you say that?" He asked bluntly, interrupting my apology. "This morning I mean, you stayed behind after those two left, called me out on lying, how did you know I was? And then you gave me advice on letting go when you don't know my reason for not wanting to coach." He gulped down more of his beer, " I mean for all you know, I might just not like soccer anymore." He turned his head to look at me, "So why say that?" He finished seriously.

I looked down to my hands which were folded on my lap and took a calming breath.

 _'Here goes nothing.'_

"W-well," I winced slightly, not a great start, "I k-knew you were lying because you didn't r-really make eye contact when you said you didn't remember and you also drink light beer which makes it rather unlikely for you to completely forget what happened while you were intoxicated." He looked really surprised at my observation and I took it as a sign to continue, "A-and as for what I said," I hid behind my bangs, feeling nervous all over again,"I-I know that you still love soccer because of the look on your face when I watched you make that shot, you looked really happy."

I smiled slightly at the memory, "So from that, it seems highly unlikely that you hate soccer, which leaves me with the conclusion that something must have happened when you were coaching the Thunderbolts' kids teams that made you stop and refuse to have anything to do with soccer anymore." I finished, still not looking up at him.

 _'I seem to be talking a lot today.'_

He was silent for a while and I thought that maybe he was angry or fell asleep. The latter being the most probable but was proven wrong on either accounts when I felt his hand on my head.

"You're really observant you know."

Before I could ask what he meant I heard Shou's voice, "Yumi-san, what are you doing here?" I looked in his direction to see that Erika and the Furuyas were with him as well. Red eyes were all narrowed at Hanashima's hand that was still resting on my head and he seemed to notice too and quickly removed it.

 _'This'll be fun to explain.'_

It seems like they came up with another tactic to try to get Hanashima to be their coach by asking him to instead help them win a mini-game against the triplets resulting in them joining the team, probably Ryuuji's idea since Erika and Shou's ideas form this morning were not very promising.

When he tried to protest the triplets started to taunt him and he fell right for it.

 _'Dummy.'_

The mini-game was turning out well and I could see that Hanashima was getting fired up. The point of the game was to highlight everyone's talent and to sort of inspire Hanashima into becoming their coach. I gave Ryuuji mental props for thinking this up. It might actually work but only if Hanashima could let go of whatever was holding him back.

The game ended when Hanashima kicked the ball far out of bounds and we trekked all the over to the nearby convenience store to find it.

Ozou had carried me over here saying it would be faster and when we got there he plopped me down and sat down right next to me while the others were standing. He was rather sitting close to me and I noticed that even the other two were making sure to stick close to us while walking over here.

 _'Strange. Wonder what's up with that.'_

"Please become our coach! Please!" Hanashima had figured out the reason for the game while I'd zoned out.

 _'Focus Yumi!'_

"Did you know about this?" I simply shrugged knowing that he was talking to me, even though my back was turned to him, because the triplets glanced at me after he spoke.

"I won't become your coach!" He said sternly and everyone looked startled but he continued, "I don't have the right to." He proceeded to explain how he'd put too much pressure on one of the he players on his old team thus resulting in an accident that ruined his eyes and his future in soccer. He walked away after that.

With this information, I could understand how he felt but not matter how guilty he feels or how hard it is for him to forgive himself, it was exactly what he needed to do in order for him to move forward in his life.

"Yumi-san, what do you think?" I looked over to him and tilted my head. "How do we get him to be our coach?" He looked hopefully at me, "You were talking to him earlier right?" I nodded and he continued, "So do you know how we could get him to join?"

I stared blankly for a few seconds and gave him a small smirk, "Just do what you do best Shou," I stood up getting ready to leave, "..annoy him until he gives in."

Before I could even take a step Ozou was in front of me and Ryuuji had stolen my crutches from me.

 _'Seriously, not again.'_ I pouted but they gave me a pointed look and I had no other choice but to get on Ozou's back.

"Yumi-chan, what were you talking with Hanashima-san about earlier?" Ryuuji asked and I figured it was about time considering they had been giving me curious glances since they saw me on the park bench.

"I said something rude to Hanashima-san this morning and was just apologizing for it." I hid my face in Ozou's back which made him chuckle, "I didn't think you could be rude, little mouse." I could feel him smirking and I huffed, "I-i-it s-sort of -j-just came o-out." He laughed at my stuttering.

They all seemed to be a little relieved after the explanation though, "Well as long as nothing happened." Ryuuji commented and the other two nodded.

 _'Where they worried about me.'_ I blushed at the thought and hid my face further in Ozou's back.

 _'This is so embarrassing.'_

The next day, Erika had dragged Reika and I out to the park to practice soccer. I was mostly watching from the sidelines but I couldn't find it in me to care about just sitting here because I was finally able to ditch those stupid crutches and had gone on a run this morning. So I was pretty happy at this moment and just hummed quietly while watching Erika and Reika.

"You're pretty good at soccer, Reika-chan!"

"Really?" Reika blushed and I had to agree, she had a natural affinity for it.

Just then we noticed Shou pestering Hanashima and refusing to stop unless he became the coach.

 _'Looks like he took my advice.'_ I snickered at Hanashima's annoyance.

"C'mon Yumi-chan!"

 _'Heh?'_ I looked up as Erika grabbed my wrist, "As his teammates, we can't just ignore him."

After apologizing to Reika, she dragged me with her to go after Shou and Hanashima.

 _'Come on, not this again!'_

We came upon the tennis courts where the Furuyas were practicing. Ryuuji and Ozou were having a match while Kota seemed to be spacing out, probably thinking about what happened yesterday.

They were talking to each other when Erika decided to get their attention, "Time for a comeback goal!" Effectively startling them and she pointed over to Shou and Hanashima.

Kota immediately shot after them and soon we were all chasing him until the late afternoon when they all finally collapsed near the river bank, thoroughly exhausted. I was used to a lot more running than this so I didn't particularly feel the need to collapse but I was a little out of breath.

 _'What a run.'_

"Jeez, how long are you going to chase me for?"

"Until you become our coach." Shou replied panting.

"Normally people would have given up already." Hanashima commented.

 _'Yeah well, they aren't exactly normal.'_

"It's something you taught me, Coach Hanashima." He looked over at Shou, "I was so bad at heading, but I got a lot better with practice." Shou had a spark in his eyes as he continued, "I can't give up."

Hanashima looked shocked and then closed his eyes in contemplation and asked them if they were sure they wanted him to be their coach to which they all replied that they did, with vigorous enthusiasm might I add.

"And you?" He was looking at me because I had been silent up to this point. "It doesn't really concern me but I would rather you coach them. You seem to be the only who can inspire them and its not like you have anything better to do, right?" I gave him a small smile.

Hanashima then agreed to become the coach saying that being the best in the country was too small of a goal, surprising everyone. "We must become number one in the entire world!" Pretty good ending to a speech if you ask me.

Everyone looked very serious right now too.

Ozou spoke thus breaking the tension, "That's it." They looked Shou, "What do we do, Captain."

"Captain?" Shou seemed confused but caught on quickly, "Eh!? I'm the captain!?"

"You were the one who brought us all together, right?" Ozou pointed out and continued, "The captain has to be you." Ryuuji agreed, "That's right," Kota nodded his head. Erika chimed in her agreement as well and Shou nervously agreed.

"You'll be fine," He looked over at me.

"Yumi-san?"

"You got this far, didn't you?" I smiled softly and he then declared that they would become number one in the whole galaxy. Erika then said something about Shou needing the most help in improving if they were ever going to be able to reach that goal and everyone laughed apart from Kota and myself.

"YUMI!"

We all looked up to see my mother standing on top of the hill.

 _'She's looks way too happy.'_

"Isn't that Satake Haru?" Ryuuji commented, "That famous track star who broke the world record twice." He then looked at me, "How do you know her, Yumi-chan?" Everyone'es attention was on me and I blushed trying to hide behind my bangs.

"She's my mom." I replied quietly but my mother continued on before they could say anything.

"Yumi!" We looked up at her again, "I have wonderful news~" She smiled brightly, "Your loving father has finally come home from his extended business trip and I made some teriyaki salmon in celebration." My eyes widened at this. Not just because dad was home but because teriyaki salmon was also my favorite food.

"But if you don't hurry up, he might eat it all before we get home~" My eyes widened even more.

 _'He would so do that.'_

"So how about we see who can get home first?" My mother smirked knowing I wouldn't give up this challenge considering there was food involved.

I smirked in return and an intimidating aura surrounded the us of both.

"I-I've never seen Yumi-chan like this." I heard Erika comment, "Its kinda scary."

"I kind of like it," Ozou spoke and Ryuuji continued, "Yes, it most certainly is interesting." Kota nodded and placed a hand on my head causing me to look at the three of them. "Go win, Yu."

That was enough for me to smile brightly and shoot up the hill and race my mother home and for the first time I managed to tie with her.

* * *

 **Well that chapter six. Yay!**

 **Thank you for reading!**

 **Please comment/review to let me know what you guys think. :)**


	7. The 11th Player

**Hey guys! Sorry for the late update, my computer was having a tantrum haha.**

 **Thank you for all the reviews. :)**

 **Anyway here's chapter 7, yay!**

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"So Yumi, you're mother tells me that you're a part of a soccer team now." I paused from devouring my breakfast and looked at my father.

I gave my mother a displeased glance, "Um..well, n-not really."

"Not really?"

I sighed, "Well, Shun-kun, a boy in my class, sometimes asks me to watch him play soccer and then tell him how he can improve." I looked down at my plate, "And he also wants me to be the assistant coach for his new team but I'm sure that won't be necessary because they have a really good coach so..." I finished quietly.

My father had a thoughtful expression, "Hmm...well I don't see the reason for you to help a soccer team when you have a music recital to prepare for," he looked at me sternly, "I expect you to do your best and not get distracted by this idea of being an assistant coach, understand Yumi?" I nodded mutely and hid a small frown under my bangs.

My mother decided to break the slight tension that filled the room, "Yumi, I got a call from Imagawa-san and he says that you're progressing quite well in practice and he's very confident that you'll be exceptional in your recital." She smiled warmly and my father gleamed proudly at the news, "That's wonderful news. I'm glad you're taking your music seriously Yumi." I nodded and smiled slightly but didn't say anything else.

My father continued, "All the more reason for you not to distract yourself with this soccer team." He gave me another stern look, "So make sure you keep your focus where it should be, alright Yumi." I nodded and once again hid a frown behind my bangs.

My father, Shimakage Shun, could be a very strict man. Don't get me wrong, I love my father and he loves me but there are times when he can be a bit controlling and that's mostly because he grew up in a house where success meant everything. So because of that, he has the same ideals for me. Mind you, he's way more lenient about it and never really pushes me unless necessary. He does want me to do my best and enjoy myself but he can be a bit narrow-minded at times.

And even though I said it was unlikely for me to even be asked to do anything for the team, I had small sliver of hope that I would be asked. No matter how much I denied it, I was starting to like the idea more and more.

 _'It won't be so hard to do both right? Why should I have to choose?'_

Those thoughts were still running through my mind a little later in the day when I joined up with Erika and Shou. We had met up with the triplets and picked Hanashima up from his apartment to go formalize his position as coach with Momoyama Kinzou, the manager of the Momoyama Predators.

They were talking about something but I was too busy thinking about what had happened this morning with my father. Maybe if I could show him that I could prepare for the recital and help out the team at the same time. It couldn't be that hard, right?

 _'Stop stressing Yumi! You'll get sick and besides, they haven't asked you to help the team yet. No point in worrying yourself over something that might not even happen.'_

I felt a hand on my head and looked to see that it was Ozou's.

"You seem distracted little mouse." His eyes showed concern, "Is something wrong?" All three brothers were looking at me with concern and I blushed shaking my head in response.

 _'Focus Yumi, don't worry everyone. It'll be fine.'_

The triplets didn't look convinced but didn't say anything and let it slide, for now.

 _'They're probably going to interrogate me later.'_ I sighed

We made it to the office building and Shou tried to enter first but was startled back with a blush on his face. Erika asked what the problem was and he said that he saw something that he shouldn't have.

Momoyama himself opened the door again, "What's wrong? Come in." He said gruffly.

We made our way in,we all stood in front of Momoyama's desk as he sat down, "So what do you want?" He didn't look very happy to see us.

"Please let us revive the Predators' sixth grade team!" Shou responded all too eagerly. Momoyama sighed, "That again?" He started filling his nails as he continued, "Can't you give that up already? It'll be the same answer every time."

Ryuuji decided to respond this time, "What if we return to the team, too?" He had his arms crossed.

"What?!" Momoyama looked shocked but quickly regained his composure, "I fired the coach because of the three of you. Thanks to that, the players left one by one." He frowned looking at the triplets, "That's why the sixth grade team disbanded." He looked at them with disbelief, "Now you're here to apologize?"

"Not really." Ozou stated with no hesitance.

Momoyama grew startled, "What?! Then why are you here?"

Shou explained that Hanashima had agreed to become the coach and that the Furuyas would come back because of it. Momoyama regarded Hanashima suspiciously, "I feel like I've seen you somewhere."

 _'Oh dear.'_

"You're that drunkard that often comes to our practice grounds! The parents will be suspicious of you." Erika tried to defend Hanashima but it didn't work, "I can't let someone like that become your coach."

"Hey, old man!" Kota protested and Ryuuji continued, " You shouldn't judge a book by its cover. Have you ever looked at yourself in the mirror." The woman sitting at the other desk laughed a little and Momoyama gave her a stern glare.

 _'Good one Ryuuji.'_ I tried to contain my giggles but I wasn't very successful and Momoyama gave me the same look making me move back a little only to bump into Kota, who put an arm around my shoulder, pulling me a little closer. Ozou and Ryuuji stepped closer as well and they all gave Momoyama a glare.

 _'W-what?'_ I was beyond confused at this behavior but wasn't going to complain any time soon since Momoyama immediately stopped giving me the evil eye and moved on.

Shou went on to explain that Hanashima was a professional player and after looking up some information Momoyama's attitude did a complete turn around. He quickly apologized for being rude.

 _'Suck up.'_

"We would be most satisfied with someone like you becoming their coach." See what I mean, "But..." Momoyama looked at the triplets.

"But?" Hanashima questioned.

Momoyama turned back to him, "These three are delinquents." The three of them protested and I couldn't help but find it a little funny.

 _'They could totally pass for delinquents if they wanted too.'_

Momoyama agreed to let Hanashima be the coach on two conditions. First he had to get at least eleven players to enter the city tournament and they had to win a match against another team to qualify.

Apparently the bulldozer was on this opposing team.

 _'Great.'_

Hanashima reassured that he would be able to take the team to nationals to which Momoyama was extremely pleased to hear.

"I also want to make another request!" Shou caught everyone's attention and Momoyama sighed, "What is it?" Momoyama asked looking a little deflated, Shou probably does this often.

Suddenly there was a hand on my shoulder, "I want Yumi-san to become the assistant coach for the team!" My eyes widened and I stared at Shou with disbelief.

"What?!" Momoyama seemed to share my shock but for an entirely different reason, "You want an elementary student to be an assistant coach." Well the idea could seem a little ridiculous but he could have phrased it a bit better than that.

 _'Don't be so sensitive Yumi.'_

"Actually, I was going to ask that as well." We all turned to Hanashima, "Shimakage-san has an amazing observation skill and is very knowledgeable. She would a great help to the team." To say I was shocked would be an understatement.

 _'When had he thought about this?'_

Momoyama regarded me carefully, "Did you say Shimakage?" His eyes narrowed a bit.

"Yes! She's Shimakage Yumi-san!" Shou enthusiastically introduced me.

Momoyama's eyes widened, "Y-you mean the Shimakage Shun's daughter!" He pointed a finger as if it was hard to belief that I was in fact the daughter of the person he was speaking about.

 _'Its not that hard to believe.'_ But the way he was looking at me was unnerving and I moved behind Kota, effectively making him a human shield while grasping onto his shirt for comfort. My action caused the triplets to glare daggers at Momoyama.

"That's right!" Shou responded, seemingly oblivious to the threatening aura that seeping from the Furuyas, "She's amazing! She also as a photographic memory and can remember anything! She would be perfect for the job." He smiled and I peeked out from behind Kota to see Momoyama's reaction.

He had a sparkling aura around him despite being mentally stabbed by the triplets. "Oh well, I suppose it would alright for Shimakage-san to help Hanashima." He went off on a tangent and we all made this our opportunity to slip away, I was still clinging to Kota. What? I was content with hiding behind the three of them, they made a good barrier. I was considering on taking them with me when I go on my newspaper route in the mornings.

 _'Maybe they could get rid of that damn dog.'_ I thought evilly.

I did let go when we started walking away from the building though, didn't want to seem completely hopeless.

 _'Let's be honest Yumi, you're pretty hopeless.'_

The topic of discussion was about getting more players on the team. Shou was pretty optimistic about the whole thing, "Are there any people at your school who might be interested?" The question was directed at the Furuyas and Kota replied, "Nope." Shou stumbled at the response.

"You're so direct." Erika stepped in, "Don't you have any friends?"

 _'Because that wasn't direct at all.'_ I gave her a blank stare and she shrugged at me.

"We're delinquents, after all." Ryuuji stated quite proudly.

They all agreed to let Shou do the scouting for team members even though he grumbled about him having to do all the work.

 _'That's what you get for being so loud.'_ I thought to myself, very much amused at his dramatics.

"Hey Yumi," I looked over to Erika, "Are you really going to be the assistant coach?" Everyone was staring at me and I realized I'd never actually given them an answer about it.

 _'Whoops.'_

I blushed, "Um..w-w-well.." I really have to get better at this, "I-if its a-alright with Hanashima-san." I looked over to him and he nodded in encouragement. "T-then I supose I c-could help a l-little but I have a piano recital to prepare for a-also." I finished lamely.

 _'We really should work on your public speaking Yumi.'_

"I think it would be rather interesting to see how you do, Mi-chan." My face burned bright red. What was up with these three nicknaming me?

 _'Not like you're doing anything to stop it.'_

Ozou rubbed my head, "Just don't stress yourself, little mouse." Kota and Ryuuji agreed with him and we all went our separate ways home.

 _'How did they know I was stressed?'_ That on thought kept playing over in my mind and I couldn't for the life of me figure out how they knew? Was I really that transparent?

I sighed _'Probably.'_

The next day I found myself walking to school with Reika, which was nice because she didn't make it a habit to try and burst my eardrums whenever she spoke. Although she was being a lot more quiet that usual.

"Yumi-chan?" She sounded really nervous and I hummed to let her know she had my attention, "D-do you think that Erika would let me be on the soccer team?" The question threw me off balance, literally, I fell over.

After I managed to right myself and assure her that I was fine, I responded, "I don't think they'll mind but.." I tilted my head curiously, "...why?" She looked down and I could tell that this was something she was struggling to admit.

"Soccer is fun." She smiled, "Besides, I can diet too." I narrowed my eyes from behind my bangs. The Furuyas were not gonna like that, especially Kota. I really hoped she wouldn't tell them that reason for playing soccer but I guess it was good that she wanted to do something for herself rather than follow her parents' instructions.

My eyes widened in realization, "Do your parents know?" She looked down and I took that as a no, "It's okay, neither do mine." I smiled weakly and she did the same.

My suspicion was correct however when she did end up giving them that reason after they asked her. Kota immediately blew up at her and she grabbed Erika for comfort. Ryuuji tried to calm him down but he still had his fists clenched, I gave him a half-hearted glare. I could understand why he was irritated but he didn't know Reika at all, much less her reasons for wanting to play. He begrudgingly accepted because they did after all need her as the eleventh player and so for the rest of the practice, my assigned job was to help Reika catch up to where the others were.

 _'How did this happen?'_ I grumbled mentally.

You see after practice I had piano lessons and when that finished I exited the building only to find all three Furuyas waiting for me. When they saw me, they insisted on walking me home and me, having awkward turtle syndrome, couldn't even stumble out any type of response.

 _'We really need to work on your social skills.'_

"So Mi-chan, what were you so distracted with yesterday?" Ryuuji questioned. I really hoped they'd let that one slide but luck was never really on my side I guess.

 _'Should I really tell them though?'_ I looked down to avoid their curious looks. I really didn't want to worry them and maybe I could convince my father that it would be fine for me to do both. _'But what if I couldn't?'_ I didn't realize I had stopped walking until I felt a hand on my head.

"Yu." I looked up at Kota. His eyes were soft causing me to tilt my head in question and Ryuuji continued for him, "Kota-kun is right." I looked over to him, "If you don't want to tell us yet, then don't worry about it." He smiled gently at me. "Just don't stress yourself little mouse." I looked over at Ozou, "We'll be here when you're ready to tell us." He patted my head and they continued walking.

I stood there for a few seconds, completely speechless but eventually snapped out of it and walked after them. They dropped me off at home, each giving me a head pat in greeting and went home. For some reason I couldn't help but grin all evening. I think my parents were a little concerned.

The next day we found ourselves at the auditorium where the teams would be assigned their position in the tournament. I was seated next to the triplets while the rest of team sat behind us. It was Shou's turn to go up on the stage.

Ryuuji couldn't help but laugh at Shou walking up the steps and even I could tell that he was nervous.

After our placement was announced a familiar voice caught our attention from in front of us, "We'll be meeting in the second round Furuya. You're going down this time." And its the bulldozer.

 _'Great.'_

"Make sure you qualify the first round before that." Ozou taunted and the bulldozer was about to retaliate but Ryuuji stepped in and calmed everything down before it got out of hand.

I simply glared at the back of his head. Yes I was still a little sore about the whole sprained ankle thing besides the guy just irritated me.

 _'A lot of people irritate you, Yumi.'_

After the announcements we made our way outside but we didn't get very far because the Furuyas noticed two people in front of us, one of them just happened to be my cousin.

 _'Aoto?'_

* * *

 **Well there you have it yay!**

 **In case you were wondering the Mi in Yumi's name means beautiful and I thought it would be cute for each of them to have their own nickname for her.**

 **Thank you for reading and for patiently waiting for an update. Comment/review if you'd like to let me know what you think. :)**


	8. The Three Tactics

**Hey guys! Apologies for the wait, I got a bit distracted this week haha**

 **Anyway, thank you so much for all of the reviews**

 **Here is chapter 8 for you, enjoy :)**

* * *

 _'What's Aoto doing here?'_

We were all standing behind the Furuyas as they faced a really tall kid and Aoto Gonzales, who just so happens to be my cousin.

 _'Of all the places to run into him, it had to be here.'_

There also seemed to be some animosity between the two standing in front of us and the Furuyas. "What do you want?" Ryuuji asked them and the tall one, whose name turned out to be Kageura, answered, "I heard that you're going back to the Predators, so I'm here to cheer you on." Well isn't that nice of him. "The Amarillos are a seeded team, so we don't play until the real city tournament. We'll be waiting for you there." Okay maybe not so nice.

"You too?" Kota directed the question towards Aoto, who had been silent up to this point and he nodded in response, "You want revenge for last year?" I frowned at Kota's question. 'Revenge for last year?' Did they play against each other last year? Aoto didn't tell me that.

 _'You weren't interested in soccer last year Yumi, so why would he.'_

Aoto glared back at Kota but before he could retort back, Momoyama spoke, "Amarillos' Emperor, Kageura-kun, is here to cheer us on himself." Seriously? Now is not the time to play suck-up. "Isn't he an idiot." Ozou commented and Ryuuji took over the conversation, "There's no way we'll loose during the prelims. There's no way he'll come all the way here just to cheer us on." Ozou decided to pitch in, "Your 'Emperor' nickname will only last until you play us. Better enjoy it while it lasts."

 _'Taunting the opponent as always.'_ Aoto at this point glanced at me but I avoided making eye contact, _'Crap, is he gonna be mad?'_

The Furuyas made their way passed them and Kota whispered something to Aoto before walking away. _'What exactly happened between them?'_

Momoyama ran after them, no doubt to lecture them on their behavior. _'Good luck with that.'_ Shou proceeded to tell Kageura and Aoto that we'd see them in the tournament and we started walking after them but before I could get away safely Aoto caught my wrist. 'What is with everyone grabbing me.'

"Yumi," I turned back to look at him, "..what are you doing with them?" I hid behind my bangs before responding, "I'm their assistant coach." I stated simply and he regarded me with inquisitive eyes. We had a sort of staring contest. It was a common thing between us and after a few seconds he let go of my wrist, "I'll see you later," and with that he walked off.

I let out a breath that I hadn't realized I was holding and went to find the others only to come across Kota angrily kicking a pole while Ozou and Ryuuji tried to calm him down.

 _'Whatever happened last year must have really upset him.'_

When he finished he shot a particularly scathing look at Reika and I frowned, _'This is not going to be fun.'_ I sighed and joined up with everyone as we piled onto the train.

I sat next to Hanashima. Shou, Erika and Reika were sitting across from us while the triplets were standing in the middle facing Hanashima. They were asking if he had thought of any tactics to which he replied that he hadn't. Ryuuji stressed that they'd need a tactic in order to get to the tournament. Kota turned around looking at Reika, "We have a heavy burden." Erika immediatly defended her and I frowned. _'I know he's irritated by her reason for playing but he really didn't have to be so snippy about it.'_

Reika looked more dis-heartened even with Shou and Erika's encouragements. I knew this was hard for her, after all we were in similar situations, both of us having parents who wouldn't approve of us participating in soccer, even if the reasons were different. It was harder for her to do something without her parents approval because she had never done it before. She glanced at me and I gave her soft smile.

 _'Hang in there.'_ She nodded at my silent message and we all went our separate ways home, well apart form me because had piano lessons.

"You're late." reprimanded me the minute I walked in. I looked down, not having anything to say so he continued, "You've also been distracted recently." His eyes were cold but there was a small spark of concern in them, "Is there something wrong Yumi-san?" I shook my head slowly, "N-no, there's nothing wrong..." I trailed off and crossed his arms over his chest, "Then what is it?" From the tone of his voice I knew it would do me no good to try to get out of this. So, I told him.

 _'Please don't let this backfire in my face.'_ I prayed in my head as I watched him process and after a few, very tension filled seconds, he responded, "Well I suppose we could adjust your piano lesson schedule a bit," my eyes widened and I gave him a surprised look, "but only on the condition that when you're here, your full attention is on the lesson, understood." I nodded and smiled broadly and we proceeded with the rest of the lesson.

 _'Why me?'_ I thought desperately as I was running away from the little devil of a dog, yet again. _'Is one uninterrupted newspaper run too much to ask for?'_

After running around like a headless chicken for about four blocks, I finally manage to shake him and proceeded to make my way back. I didn't get very far because in my haste to get back on track I again didn't notice someone in front of me and ran straight into them causing us both to fall to the ground.

 _'Nice work Yumi.'_

"That's gonna leave a mark.." I mumbled slightly and sat up while rubbing my head.

"Yumi." I opened my eyes to see Aoto giving me a slightly annoyed look. "You need watch where you're going." He said blandly and stood up offering me a hand. I took it with a sheepish look on my face, "I'm working on it."

I dusted myself off and fixed my hair which at this point was falling out of the ponytail I had thrown it into. "You're really helping out the Predators." He stated more than asked, "Yeah." Was all I decided to say. "Hmm.." He gave me a look with those icy blue eyes of his, "...and uncle knows?" I had a feeling he already knew the answer but shook my head anyway.

He stared at me for a while, probably thinking about whether or not to tell my father, but what he says instead surprised me, "Just don't get into too much trouble." And with that he walked away. I stared after him and decided it'll be best not to question his motives and just finish my route.

Later in the day I was standing next to Hanashima as he explained the tactics he had come up with, much to the relief of Ryuuji. He had come up with three and I have to admit, they were pretty good ones.

There was the Build Up or Build where the main point is that the entire team uses short passes to push the ball forward towards the goal.

Second was the Yoi where the main point is to make a long pass forward and quickly score.

And lastly is the Big Triangle or Big Tri where the Furuyas move the ball around using long passes to shake up the opponents.

 _'Hanashima was definitely the right choice to be coach.'_ I smiled watching them practice but my attention was soon back to Reika. Hanashima had left her training up to me. The main focus at the moment was raising her stamina, which she barely had any of but her determination reassured me that she would get there.

I was currently running beside her, well more like jogging beside her. "Just one more lap Reika." She didn't respond, probably because she was so out of breath. At first she insisted that I didn't need to run with her but I countered her saying that is was no fun just watching. She finished her laps, barely managing to stay on her feet but she finished them all the same.

I missed the next day's practice because I really needed to focus on my piano pieces. Hanashima said it would be fine for me to since they were only practicing the three tactics so I wouldn't be missing anything important really.

Our first match was coming up soon and I for some strange reason felt a little nervous. I sighed so much that even my mother was concerned but I shrugged her off saying that I was worrying about the recital. She seemed to buy it and assured me that everything was going to be fine and after that I promptly went to bed.

 _'What in the world did I do to piss off this damn dog!?'_

That's right, I was yet again running away from the little demon and for some reason he seemed more persistent than usual and all my attempts to slip away from him failed. This resulted in me having to abandon my route and just run around hoping that he'd either get tired or bored and give up. It didn't seem to be happening anytime soon even though he had been chasing me for half-an-hour now.

 _'Seriously, give up already.'_ In retrospect, this was really good training, mom would be so proud.

I made it to the river and noticed that the barking had stopped and glanced behind me to see that the dog was no longer at my heels.

 _'Finally.'_ But the relief didn't last long because I soon found myself tumbling down the hill. _'We're starting to make a habit out this.'_ I thought dryly as I came to a stop at the bottom. I mentally assessed myself and came to the conclusion that I had miraculously managed not to do any serious damage, only a few bumps and bruises.

I sat up groaning, rubbing my head when I heard an all too familiar voice, "Yumi-san!" I opened my eyes to see Reika, Erika, Shou and the Furuyas rushing towards me. The Furuyas arrived first, concern very evident in their eyes. Ryuuji looked me over, "You seem fine," he grabbed my chin and turned my head left and right, "Does it hurt anywhere?" His voice was filled with worry which had me slightly confused but shook my head in response.

They all seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, "What have we told you about paying attention mouse?" Ozou lightly scolded and I averted my eyes to the ground. "Sorry." My voice came out so quiet that I thought I'd have to say it again but Kota's hand on my head affirmed that they heard it, "Be more careful, Yu." Their eyes were softer now and I stared up at them in daze.

 _'This feels...nice.'_

A cough snapped me out of my trance and I looked over to Erika who had a knowing look in her eyes. _'She's getting ideas.'_ I mentally cringed.

After assuring to them that I was in fact quite alright I made my way back up the hill to finish my route which I would be finishing late thanks to that damn dog.

"Do you want some help Yumi-chan?" I looked back to Erika, ready to deny and say that I'll be fine when my messenger bag became lighter, I gave a startled look to the Furuyas, each of them hold a few newspapers in their hands.

"Don't worry little mouse, it'll be faster this way." Ozou was smirking and the other two nodded smiling at me.

"But-"

"Yu." Kota shut down my protest and I pouted, knowing that there was no way I could win this one, I handed some to the other three and instructed everyone where to go. It did end up going much faster and I finished the route somewhat on time.

I made sure to profusely thank everyone when we got back together at the field. They told me about how Reika managed to keep her eyes open when Kota shot a ball at her.

I smiled at both of them, hoping that this would help strengthen Reika's resolve and allow Kota to acknowledge her as a player rather than a burden.

 _'Here's hoping.'_

* * *

 **Thank you for reading and please leave a comment/review to let me know what you think.**

 **Hope you all have an awesome day!**


	9. Kickoff Breakthrough!

**Hey guys! Back again, I'm hoping to keep a weekly update thing going. I know some of you are keen for more updates and I'll try my best to update a bit more frequently but thank you some much for your patience. You guys are awesome.**

 **Also thank you for the reviews, really glad you guys like it.**

 **Here's chapter 9 for ya.**

* * *

"Good morning!" I winced at Shou's eternally loud voice.

"You're voice is loud as usual, Shou-kun." Way to state the obvious Erika. Gold star for you.

 _'Don't be so grumpy Yumi.'_

Well, here we are, the teams first match in the prelims. It was a morning match so I had to hustle to get here quickly after my newspaper route. It had caught the attention of my mother and when she asked where I was rushing to, I told her I was meeting up with friends before my piano lesson.

It wasn't a complete lie, I mean these guys were my friends and it was before my piano lesson today, I just left out the part about what we'd be doing. So technically not even a lie really.

 _'Whatever helps you sleep at night Yumi.'_

We were standing on the side of the field and watching our opponent, the West Sakuragawa Challengers, warm up. I found out that they were a fairly new team and thus would most likely be a weak opponent.

"They're no good." Ryuuji commented, "They're not a worthy opponent at all. We can win easily by just kicking the ball around." He shrugged but Shou protested, "That's no good. We have to go all out or else it's disrespectful." Not too sure about that one but he does have a point. We should take them seriously and play as we would an opponent who was stronger than us.

After a bit more idle chit-chat, I wasn't really listening, Hanashima and Kyouko arrived. Apparently the Momoyama couldn't make it so she came in his stead. She even brought snacks and lunch which was the reason why they were late.

 _'I like her, she brings food.'_

Shou approached Hanashima as the rest of the team started doing warm-ups. "Um, Coach Hanashima. Have you decided on the positions?" I looked up at Hanashima because I was also curious as to what he decided. He told me not to worry about it when I asked about it at practice the other day and that he'd fill me in later.

 _'He's up to something.'_ I narrowed my eyes at him as he told Shou he'd tell them when the match began.

The whistle blew and everyone gathered around to hear what Hanashima's decisions were. "I decided on you positions today based on your skills and talents." He held up a small white board and started announcing the positions starting with goalkeeper. "I want to test these positions for now during the match." I glanced at Hanashima. That means some people going to be swapped around.

 _'This does not bode well?'_

He went on and when it came to Kota and Ryuuji, he told them that their positions were swapped around. Making Kota the center midfielder and Ryuuji a forward.

I sighed, _'Yep, this will not end well.'_

The triplets were immediately angered at this, especially when Hanashima was insistent on keeping it this way for the match. _'He springs this on them before a match. What the hell is he thinking?'_

When Shou tried to calm everyone down, the triplets walked onto the field and Hanashima stated that he wouldn't say anything during the match.

"Just play however you want." My eyes widened, even I was confused at his coaching. _'What the hell is he doing?'_ The team looked unsure of what to do. I was a little upset at how the triplets acted though, I mean sure this was rather sudden for Hanashima to do this right before a match but really, they need to learn to control their tempers.

I sat down in between Hanashima and Kyuoko, while holding the white board on my lap and I looked down at the position placements.

"The 3-5-2 formation?" I mumbled titling my head.

Kyouko seemed to have the same train of thought, "If there's some sort of deep meaning behind it, you should tell them." I nodded in agreement and looked up at him. She proceeded to comment on how he had changed, apparently he was a 'demonic coach' before and used to give orders left and right.

"They have to realize something for themselves." He told her and I decided to speak, "But not to telling them anything is not exactly good either." He looked down at me, "The triplets are going to be the main problem in this game." He didn't say anything and we brought our attention to the match that was about to begin. He was right though, he really couldn't hold their hand every step of the way, they need to be able to think and make decisions for themselves in case their strategies fail them

 _'Here we go.'_

The match started and the Furuyas immediately started playing by themselves. They moved in front of everyone just to get the ball and managed to score but..

 _'That was a selfish play.'_ I frowned and even the team seemed to agree with my mental conclusion. Hanashima seemed unhappy as well.

The triplets justified the play by saying that they were just doing what the coach told them to do. "They're going to keep doing that until you switch Kota back." Hanashima nodded at my statement, "But it won't work that easily." He smiled and I sighed, _'This will not go well.'_

The other team was trying their best while our team were trying to make up for the triplets slack but Sakuragawa managed to score anyway. It was hard to watch, the Furuyas refused to pass to anyone else even though there were plenty of opportunities for them to do so and by luck Ryuuji managed to score another goal.

I was not impressed and that's putting it mildly. I understand that they're upset about Kota not being forward but to risk losing and eliminating the entire team form the competition was really not the way to go about it. Sure I don't play sport but even I understand the fundamentals of teamwork. So for them to act like this was extremely uncalled for.

It was half time and everyone was taking advantage of it and I helped Kyouko hand out the water bottles. I openly glared at the Furuyas while handing them theirs but they either didn't notice or ignored me, most likely the latter.

"Coach Hanashima. Please give us some orders." Shou sounded desperate. "Everything is a mess out there."

"That's your fault." Everyone looked at the Furuyas, "No one can match us in skill in skill level. That's why we're playing by ourselves."

"Idiots." I said quietly but loud enough because everyone looked at me with startled eyes, "So just because you don't get your way means that you have ruin it for everyone else." I full on glared at them, my eyes most likely showing the anger I was currently feeling. "If you're going to act like a bunch of spoiled brats who throw tantrums at everything that doesn't go their way then you don't deserve to play soccer." And with that I promptly turned on my heel marched off without giving anyone a second glance or listening for any responses.

 _'Well that was dramatic.'_ I sighed heavily, I seemed to be doing it a lot lately.

"So this is what you've been up to." I froze, eyes widening and turned face my doom or mother, depending on what kind of punishment she was going to give me.

When I faced her, she looked surprisingly calm. "How about you and me go have something to eat and discuss this hobby that you've picked up Yumi." She smiled and I slowly nodded.

 _'Well, at least we knew this wasn't going to end well.'_ Not helping.

We ended up in a small diner not far from the park. Mom ordered for us, but I was doubting my appetite seeing as I was most likely in a lot of trouble. The entire time mom was silent and I sure as hell didn't have the courage to say anything so I just sat there, waiting for the lecture to begin.

After a few minutes of awkward silence, mom finally looked at me, emotions running strongly through her eyes, all mixed up and making it difficult to read her, "So Yumi, how long have you been with this team?" Her voice was smooth, calmness in the tone of her voice, not giving away much of anything.

I gulped, "U-u-um f-for a w-while now." I hid behind my bangs, as if it would shield me from her.

"You're their assistant coach, right." All I could do was nod and she continued, " called to confirm the time changes for your piano lessons, imagine his surprise when he found out that I wasn't aware of this even transpiring." I fidgeted in my seat. I told Imagawa about the soccer team but not about my parents not knowing.

 _'Well that finally blew up in your face, didn't it Yumi.'_

"Yumi," I hesitated but looked up at her, "why have you been keeping this from me?" I saw one distinct emotion in her eyes now, hurt, clear as day and I immediately felt guilty. "You know you can tell me anything right?" I nodded and she furrowed her eyebrows, "Then why not tell me?"

"I thought you'd be angry." I responded quietly and she looked at me confused so I went on, "Dad told me to focus on my music and not to get distracted by helping out the team but mom.." I looked up at her, my eyes pleading, "..I-I re-really like helping them. I like being part of the team." My voice was becoming stronger as I went on, "I like to watch them play and to see how they improve. I love being on the team because they're all so passionate about playing soccer, like how I'm passionate about music. They always try to do their best." Even though I was currently mad at the triplets, I could still acknowledge their love for the game.

"I want to help them achieve their goal of becoming the best because they're my friends and isn't that what friends are suppose to do? Help each other." I looked at my mother, determination running through me, "So please mom, let me help them. It won't interfere with my piano lessons and I'll be completely focused on recital day. So please." I stared at her, throughout this ramble of mine she had said nothing, only looking at me. It was as if she was seeing something she hadn't seen in me before.

Another round of silence ensued, not the awkward kind though, this one was filled with a thick tension. Mom took a deep breath, "Yumi, I was honestly sad that you thought you couldn't tell me about this but I guess with your father in mind that it shouldn't be that big of a surprise."

Her face suddenly softened and she smiled gently at me. "Yumi, if you want to play piano and help a soccer team, then I'm not going to stop you." My face brightened, "Especially after you spoke so passionately about them. You've never done that before." I laughed awkwardly, mentally agreeing with that statement but something was still nagging at me in the back of my mind.

"But what about dad?" She sighed before replying, "He'll be a little bit harder to convince." I hummed in response. She gained a thoughtful expression, "You know what, you leave your father to me for now. Just until we figure out a way to soften him to the idea, okay?" I happily nodded and we proceeded to eat our now cold food.

 _'Yummy.'_

It was great really, I told mom about everything, from how I got dragged into the team to what happened earlier. I felt better, it was like a weight had been taken off my chest. Mom also promised she'd think of a way to get dad on board with the whole idea so I was more than a little relieved.

Mom took me to my piano lesson and explained everything to Imagawa as well and we proceeded with the lesson as planned. I tried my best not to think about the team, I promised after all but no matter what I did, my mind wouldn't stay in place. I kept repeating what happened this morning and about the whole Furuya situation.

After the lesson, I apologized to Imagawa, exited the building and much to my surprise I found all three Furuyas standing in front of me.

 _'Why are they..'_

Ryuuji interrupted my thoughts, "We came to apologize." The other two nodded, "At the second half of the game we realized that we were behaving like kinder gardeners." Ozou continued, "It wasn't fair of us to do that so we'll try to get better at playing fairly, even when something doesn't go our way." Kota chimed in, "Sorry for making you mad Yu."

I was stunned, not only had they realized how selfish they were but they actually apologized too.

 _'Well this is new.'_

Their faces became worried and I realized they we're still waiting for me to reply, "I-it okay," I stumbled out and I could feel a blush forming, "That you realized it was enough." I smiled at them, something I thought I wouldn't be doing for a while but they never failed to surprise me.

They brightened and proceeded to walk me home. On the way they filled me in on how the game went and that they had won 9-1 but it was only because Shou started calling out good instructions and the triplets seemed to get over Kota's position placement and they started passing to the other players.

After the match they went to watch the bulldozer's team play against their first opponent and Shou found out that Reika had asked Kota to help train her, that was a real shocker but I was glad that she did it. Kota would be the best person to help her out.

"I'm glad it worked out." I smiled at them and they wished me a goodnight and each gave me the now usual pat on the head as they left.

 _'I really need to ask them why they keep doing that.'_

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 **Well there it is. Yay!**

 **Thank you for reading and please comment/review to let me know what you think.**

 **:)**


	10. Suguro SpecialCounterattack!

**Here it is chapter 10! Enjoy.**

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So here we are. The match between Momoyama and Tsubakimori SC is about to begin and it seemed the match was personal for not only the players but also their managers, who were currently having some sort of shouting match.

 _'And they're supposed to be the adults in this situation.'_ I thought blandly.

I was currently seated in between Kyouko and a strange man, whom she said was interesting before she dragged me with her. _'Again with the dragging.'_ I sighed. I noted the man sitting next to me, he was wearing a hat with sunglasses and a camera standing on a tripod.

 _'I wonder why he's filming the game?'_

The match started and it immediately became difficult for the team to make any shots. Even when Kota was ready to shoot a ball right at the goal the other team managed to get it away from him. They passed it to the bulldozer, who went a head and scored the first goal of the game.

 _'So that was his special move.'_

In all honesty, it was a rather good play, even if the play was made the bulldozer. "That #4 player is wonderful." The man's voice caught my attention, "The Predators don't have a player like him." I nodded in agreement because it was true. The bulldozer was a good player, the kind who could turn his emotions into strength.

"The match just started, though." The man looked down at me and smiled, "That is very true little lady." He laughed a little and I tilted my head in confusion.

 _'Was it something I said?'_

The next play began and the ball son in Kota's possession but he was quickly blocked by Suguro. Kota had a clean chance pass back to Ozou but refused and charged to shoot again. Clearly, the bulldozer had said something and goaded him into trying to take shot. "Dummy." I stated blandly.

"He's the type of player that can turn his emotions into power. It's really interesting." The old man commented on Suguro again while said person managed to get the ball away from Kota, kicking the ball out of bounds and tripping Kota in the process, which he looked pretty smug about while walking away.

I sighed at Kota frustration, "He really needs to calm down." My mumble caught the attention of the man and he seemed to be looking at me questioningly, it was hard to tell through the sunglasses. I decided to humor him, just in case, "Kota is a very quiet person and normally very cool headed but when it comes to soccer, he becomes hot-headed and impulsive." I finished my explanation and Kyouko giggled slightly causing me to look at her.

"You seem to know a lot about them in general Yumi. Are you dating them?" I gasped and looked at her extremely flustered. She looked very happy with herself and the man looked curious, again hard to tell because of the sunglasses.

"Wha-its-I-" I had absolutely no idea what I was trying to say but whatever it was, it wasn't going to come out clearly because my brain just decided to malfunction. My face was most likely already red too. Kyouko didn't continue but had a knowing look on her face and turned back to watch the match while I tried to calm down my fast-paced heart beat that was now in stuck in my throat.

 _'Where did that come from?'_

My attention was returned to the match. After a few attempts at shooting were blocked, the bulldozer managed to steal the ball from Kota yet again and when he took the shot Shou and opposing player jumped for it. Shou managed to deflect the ball but he hit the other player in the face with his elbow in the process. He got given a yellow card as a result.

"That's gonna shake his confidence..." I mumble out loud, mostly to myself but Kyouko nodded in agreement

It soon became evident that Shou was not himself because in the next play the bulldozer made his 'special play' to right instead of left like normal and Shou hesitated in blocking, thus losing his chance to steal the ball. Thankfully Reika got in front of Suguro and blocked him from making a clear shot causing it to be blocked by the goalie instead.

"What's the matter with Shou-kun?" Kyouko asked while petting Zach.

"He's gotten caught up in the mud. This match is completely different than the first one." The man commented while typing furiously on his laptop, "How will this match continue? I'm looking forward to it." I nodded slightly in agreement but I was worried that Shou wasn't going to snap out of it.

 _'This is something he needs to experience Yumi. He 'll pull through.'_

The next play was hard because the team had less people in the front since Ozou was helping out Shou in defense. When Tsubakimori tried to score again the ball hit the side of the goal instead which prevented it from going in.

 _'That was close.'_ I think everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

The ref blew the whistle signifying the end of the first half of the match. I made my way towards the team, grabbing some water bottles and handing them out. Kota patted my head when I handed him his water bottle. Momoyama was pretty peeved off at this point, his whole face was red with anger. It was kinda funny..

"Sorry, everyone." Everyone turned to looked at a very disheartened Shou, "Both goals were my fault." He looked really depressed and avoided eye contact as Ozou responded, "Even if you apologize, that won't change anything. Shou, learn from Ryuuji a bit." Both Ryuuji and Shou gave him confused looks, "He's missed so many shots, but he still keeps on shooting." I giggled at that and Ozou smirked at me.

"Okay everyone. What do the Predators lack right now?" Hanashima grabbed everyone's attention looking very at ease with the situation.

Ryuuji answered, "I really don't want to say this, but we lack Suguro-kun's intense drive and guts to win."

"Correct, anything else." Hanashima asked and this time Kota answered, "Shou's captaincy." Erika immediately tried scolding him for being so blunt but in all honesty, he was right.

Hanashima seemed to agree, "No, Kota-kun's right." He looked over at Shou, "Why do you think I made you captain?"

"Well, because I gathered everyone here." He stated quietly.

"Not just that."

"Because his voice is loud?" Reika offered.

"That's true too."

I decided to speak up, "Because he has good field vision and great defensive positioning." Shou looked at me startled and I smiled.

"That's exactly right." Hanashima smiled, "Don't get scared just because of a yellow card. That's very unlike you." He continued on to compliment Reika on her improvement and she blushed in response.

Everyone then started saying how they haven't heard Shou's loud voice on the field at all during the first half of the match and they continued to encourage him to use it more. Shou teared up but wiped his eyes before laughing a little.

Anyway the encouragement seemed to have worked because the second match started and Shou seemed to be back to his normal self and started calling out to the players with that loud voice of his.

Shou called out Build, which if you weren't paying attention, is one of the three tactics the team had been practicing. They didn't really want to use any tactics yet but desperate times call for desperate measures.

"Interesting." I looked up at the old man.

 _'We really need to learn his name or at least call him something better than old man.'_

"That kid's play is completely different from before."

"Looks like he woke up." Kyouko commented, "His motivation's back I guess."

"Motivation? I see." He began typing again.

I nodded in agreement, "Skill and ability can only take you this far." He paused from typing to look at me, "You need a certain amount of mental strength." I finished and the man decided to pat my head.

 _'Now who does this remind you of?'_

"Very good little lady." He praised and I blushed hiding behind my bangs. What is with everyone patting my head?

We brought our attention back to the game and witnessed Kota finally making a shot, scoring a point for us. Momoyama seemed ecstatic despite the fact that we needed to score another just to make it even.

 _'Don't be such a pessimist Yumi.'_

The next play resulted in us getting an even score with Tsubakimori. The game was turning around and you could see the excitement on the team's faces. They even started having fun with it. Ozou had the ball when Shou called out Big Tri. Ozou passed the ball to Ryuuji who passed the ball to Kota, who in return scored the next goal making the Predators take the lead with 3-2.

 _'Nice call Shou.'_

After that they managed to get another goal until Ryuuji tried scoring. He kicked the ball towards the goal but it went straight to Suguro's feet and then in the goal. It resulted in getting a goal but I had to wonder about how it was played out.

"Hmm.." I tilted my head and watched Ryuuji's face. From the looks of it was most likely planned to end up that way. Hanashima and the ref seemed to have the same thoughts.

"Say little lady," I looked up towards the man, "..what do you think that goal was just now?" I tilted my head, knowing exactly what he was getting at. "It seemed like it was planned." I responded and Kyouko seemed surprised at this. After all it was a difficult thing to pull off. The man mumbled something about how to score this but I wasn't paying attention because the match was getting interesting.

 _'I wonder what Ryuuji will try next?'_

But much to my surprise, it was Ozou who seemed to be next to plan something. Instead of passing the ball around in order to just run down the clock and win that way, he made a fairly easy pass straight to aTsubakimori player. I tilted my head and noticed him sharing a look with Ryuuji.

 _'So they're in on it together huh?'_

The next shot was made by Erika, much to her own surprise. It seems that Ozou's plan was to get Tsubakimori away from their goal and score while they were scrambling to get back in defense.

 _'A pretty good plan if you as me.'_ I smiled at the looks on the other team's faces.

In the end the Predators won 6-2. Pretty impressive seeing as the game started pretty bad. I was proud of them, they were faced with a challenge and overcame it.

 _'Not too bad I guess.'_

"Well then little lady," The man once again grabbed my attention, "It seems they came through." I nodded, smiling up at him. I looked over towards the team and noticed the triplets staring at us, more specifically at the man beside me. I tilted my head. _'I wonder if they know him?'_

We made our way over and Momoyama announced that he would treat everyone in celebration of winning against Tsubakimori.

I, however, didn't find myself celebrating with them because I had another piano lesson and it was taking a bit longer than usual.

"You're doing well Shimakage-chan," encouraged after I finished playing the Fur Elise, "You've only slipped up twice so I think by next week you'll have the hang of it." I smiled and packed up my notes. The lessons had been going a lot better now that my schedule matched up to the teams' game and practice schedules. I didn't have to worry about missing any lessons or games which was good. I still needed to tell dad about this but mom assured me the we'd handle it.

"Enjoy your lesson Mi-chan?" I snapped my head up at Ryuuji's voice. There they were, all three of them, newly showered and out of uniform, but standing in front of me none the less.

"Um, y-yeah." Yeah my speaking skills still needed work, "It was g-good." I stumbled out and they smiled and began walking in the direction of my house, "Um..why are you here?" They looked back at me, "I-I m-mean why aren't you celebrating with the team?" I clarified for them.

They simply shrugged and I figured I'd find out later and walked after them. This had become quite routine for us. They always walked me home after my piano lessons and I was starting to wonder why. I mean this wasn't typically normal behavior for them.

Then Kyouko's question as to whether we were dating or not sprang into my mind and I almost tripped over my feet, my face gaining its usual red color. 'Why are you even thinking about that now Yumi?' Its not we were dating and I don't really think you could date three people at the same time right? Any way, I had no time to be thinking about such things when the fact that my father was going to kill me when he finds out I'm helping the team. I f he found out I was in any sort of relationship with not one but three boys then all hell might break loose.

 _'You're overthinking things again Yumi.'_

"Yu." I snapped out of my thoughts looking up at Kota, who looked concerned and I realized that I had stopped walking. "Are you alright mouse?" Ozou questioned looking just as concerned as his brothers. "Oh um, yeah." That was all I seemed to manage.

"Mi-chan is something bothering you?" Ryuuji's hand was on my head and I hid behind my bangs, even though I knew they hated when I did.

 _'What do I say?'_

"I-I'm a little worried about something but its fine." There was silence and then I felt someone taking my bangs out of my eyes and lifting my head up. I found myself looking at Ozou, "What is it little mouse?" His voice was soft, coaxing a response from me and Ryuuji added in for good measure, "You can tell us." He smiled softly and Kota nodded firmly.

For some reason, tears were starting to from in my eyes. _'Why are you crying?'_

"Well..you see," I decided to just let my mouth do the talking and explained the situation to them. They listened eagerly and patiently, often coaxing me with a heads rub or soft whispers whenever I needed it.

 _'This is kinda nice.'_

After I had managed to explain the situation, they were quiet for a while. Ryuuji had his arms crossed with a small frown on his face, Ozou had hand on my head and Kota stood facing away from us a little with his hands in his pockets. They all seemed to be deep in thought. Maybe I shouldn't have said anything.

 _'Not like you could help it. You kinda just blurted it out.'_

"So..." I started, still trying to think of the right thing to say but nothing came to mind.

"Don't worry Yu." I looked at Kota, he looked relaxed, "Kota-kun's right, you shouldn't worry Mi-chan. We'll figure it out." Ryuuji smiled giving me a head pat, "And if not, we can always persuade your old man." Ozou finished with a smirk. All I could do was smile and nod since my ability to speak was more often than not a let down, nodding seemed like a good response.

And with that, they continued to walk me home and for some reason I couldn't stop smiling.

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 **Thank you so much for reading, I hope you're enjoying it, if not then let me know by commenting/reviewing.**

 **Thanks again for you patience and I'll see you next time.**


	11. Demon Extermination

**Well here we are. Terribly sorry for the late update. Life just seemed to get really busy so thanks so much for all the comments and your patience.**

 **Hope you enjoy!**

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So it turns out that I had missed something major at the celebrations the other night.

Reika had called me later that night, pretty much in tears, informing me that her mother had found out about her playing soccer and forbid her from ever playing again.

I tried my best to comfort her and assure that everything would be alright, but honestly, I was now even more terrified that my dad was going to find out about it as well. Since Reika's father and my father were business partners, there was a chance that my father could hear about this and start wondering whether or not I'm involved.

 _'Don't be silly Yumi. Reika would never tell them you're involved, you're over thinking again.'_ Taking a deep breath I cleared my mind of those thoughts and allowed it to focus on other things, like the triplets and their behavior towards me but that only proved more puzzling after thinking about it over and over again.

 _'Maybe we should try not thinking at all.'_

The next day was pretty much a blur because nothing really exciting happened apart from Reika disappearing from her room, only to be found where she usually practiced soccer and then encouraged by Kota, in his own way, to do what she wanted to do and not what her parents wanted. Other than that nothing really happened apart from a lot of practice for the district quarter final.

I was currently standing next to Hanashima after another day of practice when Erika asked what our next opponent, the Kobayashi soccer team, would be like.

Shou explained since Hanashima didn't really know, "They're what you call a fighting team." Well that doesn't help at all but luckily for me he clarified, "Football players need not only skill but etiquette and emotional strength. All of their players practice a martial art like judo or karate." Well that's not intense at all. "So all of their players are huge and possess a strong presence. They may be big but their speed is no joke." So they're both strong and fast. Great.

After that coach announced the lineup, it was mostly identical to the last one but he swapped Kota and Ryuuji, something Kota was extremely happy judging by the look on his face but Ozou seemed concerned.

 _'Wonder what that's about.'_ I didn't question it however, since it wasn't really any of my business. That very afternoon I was, for once, walking home alone after my piano lesson. I wonder where the Furuyas were. They've been walking me home more often than not so it felt pretty weird walking out of the building and not seeing them there, all wearing some form of a smirk.

 _'Honestly Yumi! You're not some lost puppy, you can walk yourself home, you've done it plenty of times.'_ I shook my head and nodded in determination. I couldn't believe myself, I'm not dependent on them, I'm perfectly fine walking by myself. They probably had something to do, so there's reason to get upset over nothing.

 _'Its not exactly nothing though.'_ I often found myself stuck with these thoughts lately. The kind where I pondered the reason as to why the triplets behaved the way they did with me. They weren't really like this with anyone else, so what made me special? I shook my head and tried to focus on getting home without thinking about the Furuya triplets or falling over my feet more than once.

But before I even made it home I spotted Aoto and his friend practicing, well it was more Aoto kicking the ball at the post and his friend watching. I decided to sit on the hill and watch since there was really no rush to get home.

 _'So he's imitating Diego Maradona from Argentina.'_ Aoto was good at it too but I had to wonder about his reasoning for doing so. I knew about how his dad left and how he was a SOCCER player. That was one of the reasons Aoto played soccer, not to find his dad but so that his dad could find him. Though Aoto was never this into shooting in all of his other pratcices.

 _'Must be because of Kota.'_

Just then I noticed that Aoto's friend was beginning to make his way back up the stairs, he saw me and all we did was nod to each other before he went on his way. My attention went back to Aoto, who was now furiously kicking the ball at the crossbar.

I stood up making my way towards him, "You're really good at that." He stopped the ball and looked at me. I gave him a weak smile, "It's not often that someone can imitate so well." He said nothing and resumed kicking the ball.

"Are you having fun with the Momoyama Predators?" His question didn't really surprise me, so all I did was nod in response and he continued shooting. Even though we were on different sides, he'd still look out for me and I'd do the same in return. He walked me home afterward coming inside to briefly say hello to my mother before going home himself.

The next day was game day and almost immediately I knew that there was going to be a problem, the referee was the same one from the previous game and by the look on his face, he was not happy to see the Furuyas in particular.

The other team didn't look very friendly either. I knew Shou wasn't kidding when he said they were big but man were they huge, they could probably lift a small cow if they wanted to.

 _'Don't be ridiculous Yumi, more like lift a car.'_ At this point I was really happy that I had no athleticism what so ever because I really did not feel like being plowed over by these brutes.

The game began and just as I had predicted, the referee was going to be a problem. Apparently he didn't like the Furuya's attitudes to soccer and decided to be biased for Kobayashi. _'This is going to get annoying.'_ From the looks of it Hanashima was beginning to realize the problem too.

The game went on like this, resulting in no one getting a goal and both Kota and Ozou receive unfair yellow cards. Even when Shou called out some good shots we still didn't manage to make any ground because of the opponents defense. Everyone was getting a little frustrated, with good reason of course. I was more than ready to march up the ref and give a piece of my mind.

It was halftime now and Hanashima addressed the team, "I just want to say one thing. You guys are strong." I smiled at everyone's shock and continued for him, "Just play your own style of soccer. You'll definitely win." Those words seemed to help the team bounce back and they started gaining confidence.

Hanashima spoke to the Furuyas separately as well, no doubt telling them to play their own style as well and to stop worrying about the referee.

"This coach is really different." I heard Kota say as I walked up to them, "Isn't that why you chose him though?" They looked down at me and I tilted my head, waiting for a response. I received one in the form of Ozou patting my head. "Well, now that we have the coach's permission, let's just roll with it." Ryuuji said as he and Kota started wetting their hair.

 _'What are they doing?'_

I received my answer when they finished and boy was I speechless. They adopted Ozou's hairstyle and now looked the most identical I've ever seen them. Everyone else was just as surprised as I was.

The second half began and things were in our favor, the opponent was having trouble differentiating between the triplets causing them to get confused, mark the wrong one and allowing Ryuuji to score a goal. The referee was also having it pretty rough, mistaking Ryuuji for either Ozou or Kota by giving him a red card but since he was confused it was only a yellow card.

In the end we won 0-3 and the demon triplets definitely seemed to be living up to their title. _'They really are Demon Triplets.'_ I smiled as the team cheered.

Instead of heading home, I decided to head to the soccer field by the river to watch the sunset. There was no piano lesson today so I decided to take the scenic route home instead. Sitting and watching the sunset was one of the calmest things in the world to me, well besides playing the piano. It always helped me clear my thoughts and be at peace for a bit.

"Are you lost, little mouse?" I gave a small shriek and looked up to see the triplets on top of the hill. "We were wondering where you ran off to." Ozou smirked as he lounged beside me, Ryuuji sitting on the other side after giving me a head pat and Kota maneuvered himself behind me so that I sat between his legs as he draped his arms over my shoulders. He was very casual about it while I on the other hand was having an internal battle to keep my face from turning red.

 _'And que blushing.'_ I obviously lost that battle but soon managed to calm down and relaxed a bit. It was kinda nice. We just sat there, not needing to fill the silence but instead just enjoying each others company. I sighed and started humming _Say Anything_.

"You've got quite a voice Mi-chan." I immediately stopped humming, embarrassed that I'd gotten lost in thought but nodded in thanks. It was strange how I felt comfortable to hum in the presence of someone, seeing as I would usually only either hum or sing when I knew I was alone. I didn't have stage fright, I just didn't like singing in front of people.

Nothing else was said after that and after the sun had set, they walked me home, we talked a little about the game but it was mostly quiet.

They promptly dropped me off and with a pat on the head, they went on their way home. Mom greeted me and we talked about how the game went and when dad was going to be home from his trip. It was decided that after what happened with Reika, that we would inform my father as soon as he got home and believe me, I was not looking forward to that conversation.

We still had time to figure out how to tell him but for now we caught up on how our days went. Mom even questioned me about how the triplets were doing and when I'd introduce them. In response to this I once again blushed furiously, excused my self as quickly as possible and tripped up the stairs to get my room where I promptly shut the door and sighed.

 _'There is no way in hell that's happening.'_

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 **Thanks for reading, please comment/review to let me know if you liked it and I'll try to get the next chapter out as soon as possible. Again thank you so much for you patience. You guys are awesome!**


	12. Own Goal

**Hey guys! Apologies for the long wait but I kinda got a little distracted haha**

 **Thanks for all the reviews and patience. I hope you enjoy this chapter :)**

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"Hey Yumi-chan?"

"Hmm"

"Are you dating the Furuyas?"

I promptly tripped and fell flat on my face.

"Yumi-chan! Are you alright?"

 _'Yes, the ground just needed a hug.'_

I managed to stand up, assure Reika that I was fine before giving Erika a particularly bland look, which didn't really work because my treacherous face was betraying me through the blush I felt spreading across my cheeks."I h-have no i-idea w-what you're t-t-talking about."

 _'Dammit, why did you have to stutter Yumi?'_

She smirked knowingly, "Don't even try to deny it. I've seen the way they act around you." I hid behind my bangs in an attempt to hide the blush that was now spreading to my neck and to avoid making any form of eye contact with her. Oh dear Lord what should I say?

"GOOD MORNING!"

 _'And saved by the obnoxiously loud friend.'_ I breathed a sigh of relief as Erika's attention fell onto Shou. Reika patted my shoulder sympathetically and I nodded to her in appreciation.

 _'You won't be able to avoid it forever you know.'_ It was true, Erika would without a doubt ask about this again later. She'd probably corner me somewhere and demand answers. I shuddered just thinking about it. It's not that I mind her asking, okay maybe I mind a little, but its more that I didn't really know what to say because I didn't even know the answer to the question. Are we dating? Isn't it weird to date more than one person? Should I ask them? What if I'm overthinking this?

 _'You won't know unless you ask them Yumi.'_ I sighed again, I really didn't want it to come down to that but it was probably the only way I'd know for sure what this thing between me and the Furuyas were. However, maybe I could try to avoid it as long as possible, I mean we're still young, no need to rush, right? I am after all, a big fan of ignoring something until it just goes away. It usually works, so why not now?

 _'That's rather optimistic. Doubt it'll work but good for you.'_

I pushed my thoughts aside when we got to class. Everyone was congratulating Shou and Erika on the match and they were soaking up every second of it. I smiled at Reika and she returned it as we watched Erika teasing Shou about the fact that he hadn't scored yet.

 _'He'll get there.'_

"Shou-kun." Our attention was turned to the three younger girls standing in our classroom doorway. They were fidgeting and had slight blushes on their faces, they were very clearly nervous. "These girls have something to ask you." He approached them happily although a bit confused.

"What is it?"

"Yes..U-um.." The one in the middle stammered out.

 _'At least you're not the only one who can't form a coherent sentence without stuttering. Congratulations Yumi!'_

"Um..we saw the match yesterday.." The girl started.

"I was so touched that you were able to beat such an amazing team!" Another girl continued.

 _'Aww Shou has some admirers.'_ I snickered at hte looks everyone faces. They were completely dumbstruck while watching these girls praise Shou. It kinda was hard to believe but hey, maybe they have a thing for noisy people. They kept encouraging us to win the next game which caused Shou to scratch his head in embarrassment. It was rather funny. They each then brought out a present from behind their backs and presented them to him.

 _'How nice of them. Such lovely girls.'_

"Please give this to Kota-san!"

 _'Wait?'_

"Please give this to Ryuuji-san!"

 _'What?'_

"Please give this to Ozuo-san!"

 _'Huh?'_ My eye twitched as I watched everyone begin to laugh at poor Shou's predicament. I, on the other hand found nothing funny about this situation at all. Okay, it was a little funny but come on. How inconsiderate of them to ask this of Shou. The poor boy looked thoroughly disheartened and even more embarrassed at everyone's poor attempt at hiding their laughter. If those girls admire the Furuyas so much, they should give them the presents in person, cowards. _'Says you.'_ Wait, no they should just not give them the presents at all.

"U-u-m Y-Y-Yumi-chan?" I looked over at Reika and Erika but when my gaze landed in them they and a few of the others who were standing close by, took a step away from me.

"What." I snapped slightly.

"U-um a-are you o-okay?" Reika stammered out.

"Yes. Why?" She looked rather hesitant at answering so Erika did instead, "Well you kind of have this dark aura around you and you look pretty mad." I blinked and realized I had been glaring at them. I shook my head so that my bangs hid my eyes and mumbled out an 'it's nothing' and proceeded to ignore their stares to sit down at my desk.

I was in a foul mood for the rest of the day and I can't even begin to explain why. Everyone wisely decided to leave me alone for the day, which I'm grateful for but I continuously saw Erika giving me amused glances every now and then. She didn't say anything but I _knew_ that she was going to say something about it later and I was hoping that by the end of the day she'll have forgotten all about it. That or I'd have to somehow magically obtain that power to turn invisible.

 _'Not likely.'_ I sighed and blatantly ignored our teacher prattling on and on about something that I already read about. Again having an eidetic memory wasn't always the best thing in the world but then again, it certainly beat having to actually try and pay attention to a boring lecture about the significance of fruit flies. At least I could daydream knowing that it didn't really matter if I listened or not.

I didn't stay for the whole school day because at around lunch Hanashima had showed up and told me that we had to go somewhere. Apparently he had gotten permission from my mother to be let out of school early. Which saved me the trouble of having to explain it to her later when the school would call and ask why had to leave school with a man who wasn't a relative.

 _'That would've been awkward.'_

Throughout the train ride, Hanashima didn't say a word, all he did was stare at the disks he had in his hands. They were recordings of all the matches had so far. When I saw them, my mind started to piece together the reason for this trip. _'He's worried about the own goal thing.'_ I sighed and prepared myself for what would most likely be a long afternoon.

We finally arrived at the training grounds for the Chiba Thunderbolts. Hanashima stared at the training fields, no doubt getting lost in his memories but quickly moved on towards the door while I stumbled after him. We entered the building and arrived at the Technical Advising Room where Hanashima seemed to loose his nerve and began to fidget in front of the door.

"Do you want me to knock?" I asked bluntly, not entirely pleased with just standing outside an office door after we came all this way. He scoffed and knocked, we immediately got permission to enter and promptly sat down on the couch.

"It's been so long that I was a bit surprised when I got your message." The man making coffee, whose name I did not know, commented. All I knew was that he was Hanashima's coach when he was a professional player. They exchanged pleasantries and he offered me some coffee after Hanashima introduced me but I declined seeing as I didn't really enjoy coffee.

 _'I'm also a little young to be drinking coffee anyway.'_

"So why are you here today? Not to reminisce about the past right?" Hanashima nodded and proceeded to use the DVD player in order to show the ex-coach our reason for being here. He immediately began commenting on the matches and was becoming more interested by the second until he noticed Ryuuji's first own goal and then another until he switched of the TV all together. Hanashima then asked the ex-coach what he would say in this situation. I frowned a bit, _'So he's concerned about Ryuuji being a problamatic player?'_ Why should it matter if he scores that way? Isn't scoring a goal the whole point? It's just Ryuuji's way of playing soccer.

The ex-coach told Hanashima to deal with it on his own and then proceeded to say that we wouldn't be able to conquer the nation with this team. I frowned even more but didn't say anything because he might have something interesting to say. Or not but you know, hoping for the best.

 _'You're really pushing this whole optimistic today.'_

"You rely on the triplets too much." I snapped out of my thoughts and turned my attention back towards the conversation. "They act like they're kings even without the ball. The center back does not give orders on what tactic to use, but that won't work at the national level. There's only one answer. Team play." I tilted my head to side, _'Team Play?'_

He then tossed a video of another match at Hanashima, the one where the Netherlands beat Brazil. I didn't really know much after that since it had never been really relevant to me.

 _'Guess we better start researching again.'_ Great more work.

We left after that and headed towards the training fields because the ex-coach had asked Hanashima to and I just tagged along. What we found there was one of the most extraordinary things I had ever seen in my life. There was a practice match on and it seemed that all of the players were wearing some sort of blind fold thing over their eyes.

 _'Look Yumi, even blind people are better at sports than you!'_ I pouted at the thought.

We were then informed by a cleaner that it was called blind soccer, for people who had eye problems. Hanashima seemed shocked but who could blame him, the players were playing just as good as any other player who had no vision problems. There was one in particular who was rather skilled but when he made a shot, I heard Hanashima gasp. I looked up at him and noticed that he had gone completely stiff.

He shook it off slightly and walked away without saying a word, I was piratically tripping in my efforts to keep up with him. We didn't get very far because a lady, who was leading the skilled blind player called out to us. The boy then introduced himself as Kuribayashi Youhei. My eyes widened and Hanashima stood stock still.

 _'This was the player who..'_ I glanced at Hanashima, he was shocked of course. This must be the first time he's seen Youhei since the accident. I wonder what'll happen.

They exchanged a rather awkward conversation, well mostly for Hanashima since he couldn't really seem to find the right words to say. It was what Youhei said that really got to Hanashima though. Youhei told him that he had been worried about him but was relieved when he found out that he was coaching again.

 _'He doesn't blame him at all for the accident.'_ I smiled and hoped that Hanashima's guilt would lighten a little seeing Youhei was still playing soccer.

They parted on good terms but I could still see the tension in Hanashima's shoulders. I guess this was becoming too much for him. I followed silently behind him as we walked down the side walk, neither of us said anything.

 _'What should I do, I'm not really good with these kinds of things.'_ I frowned and decided it would be best to not say anything since there was nothing much I could say to improve the situation, so it was best to just stay quiet. Even though I made this decision, it didn't make me feel any better but I kept walking none the less. All of a sudden Hanashima began running down the hill and after a moment of confusion I raced after him. He came to a stop in a parking lot and collapsed on his knees breathing harshly only to break into sobs a moment later.

My eyes started tearing up watching him, I could feel the pain radiating off of him and I was kinda lost as to what to do. Going on instinct, I sat myself down in front of him on my knees and hugged him. He didn't respond at first, only sobbed uncontrollably, I was about to let go, thinking that I wasn't helping but as soon as my arms started to loosen, he pulled me into a bone crushing hug. I immediately hugged him back as he cried.

"It'll be okay," I whispered, trying not cry. "Everything i-is going to be a-alright." My voice shook as a tear broke loose and fell down my face. All attempt at verbally comforting him went out the door at that point so I just hugged him and let him cry whilst silent tears streamed down my own face.

It was late afternoon when we parted ways, I had a late piano lesson to get to and Hanashima felt like going for a walk. We didn't say anything about what happened before but he did thank me for coming and being there today, to which I blushed and stubbornly said, "Don't be stupid, I'm the assistant coach, I'm supposed to be there for you. So don't worry." He laughed and waved goodbye, I smiled knowing that he felt a bit better and proceeded to my piano lesson.

The lesson went as well as could. After everything today, I felt tired and a little sad. What happened today with Hanashima was taking a toll on my own emotions and I really just felt like crying. went easy on me today, he could probably tell that I wouldn't really get any good practice in so he just let me play whatever I wanted instead. I was really grateful but promised that I would be more focused next time.

By the time we finished, it was getting dark. offered to give me a ride home but I declined and said I'd be fine. I honestly just wanted to go for a run but that wouldn't be a good idea seeing as it was getting dark and I'd end injuring myself before I'd even start running.

I exited the building to see the triplets waiting for me like they always do. "There you are mouse, we were starting to wonder where you were." Ozou smiled along with Ryuuji. I'd noticed Ryuuji looked a bit troubled lately but he seemed to be better now. That's good. "Yu." Kota's hands were brushing my bangs from my eyes. I hadn't even realized they's covered my eyes all day When they got a view of my eyes though, their expressions became concerned. "Mi-chan, you're eyes are red." Ryuuji stated and all I could was stare at them, my eyes welling up again.

 _'Dammit.'_

Before they could say anything I launched myself at Kota and hugged him, burying my face into his chest. He stiffened, not expecting it but almost instantly relaxed and put an arm around me and hand on my head. I felt two more hands on my head, "Mi-chan, are you alright?" Ryuuji rubbed my head a little and Ozou continued "Yeah what's with the tears little mouse?" I shook my head, "I'm just tired." My voice was quiet and slightly muffled because my face was still pressed to Kota's chest.

They said nothing further and after a few minutes of standing there, I moved away and smiled at them before walking towards the direction of my house. They were soon walking beside me and I grabbed onto Ozou's sleeve as we walked. They began telling me about the training today and the presents they had received. I wasn't as bothered about it as I thought I would be. It was mostly due to the fact that they bluntly expressed their disinterest in them. I giggled a little as Kota made a face at the thought of them.

 _'So you were jealous for nothing huh?'_

I promptly tripped and fell over again.

 _'Today was a really long day.'_

* * *

 **There you are. Again sorry for the wait.**

 **Please review/comment to let know what you think about it.**

 **Thanks for reading.**


	13. Strong Point and Date?

**Here it is everyone. My sincerest apologies for the wait and MIA-ness recently. Life suddenly got busy and then I was stuck on hoe to write this chapter mainly cause I suck at improvising haha.**

 **Anyway, thank you so much for all the comments and follows/favorites. Really appreciate the support and hopefully the next chapter will come a bit quicker next time. Apologies in advance if it doesn't.**

 **Here we go.**

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 _'I hate everything.'_

Yep, that is definitely the first thought that crossed my mind the next morning. Consciousness came rather slowly, and the moment my mind became coherent, I felt horrible. My head was pounding and I felt cold and hot all at the same time.

 _'Well done Yumi, you've managed to get us sick.'_ Breathing a heavy sigh I forced myself out of bed. When I got to the bathroom my reflection in the mirror was waiting for me and what greeted me did not look pretty. My face was paler than what it would normally be and my skin looked clammy. My dark hair was disheveled and all over the place while my usually bright looking eyes appeared duller than normal. So all in all, I looked like a ghost out of some horror movie.

 _'This should be fun.'_

Pressing on I took a shower and proceeded with my morning routine, all be it a little slower than normal. Fortunately my delivery route was shorter today so I didn't have to really run all out to finish it in time and I made sure to drink some cold medicine before heading out the door. Both my parents were away so I had the house to myself for two more days and hopefully this would pass before they got home.

My mother would have most likely scolded me for getting sick and then fuss over me the second she finished and, while I appreciate it, I'd rather not go through that thank you very much. Being sick in general just sucked, so I avoided it as often as possible. But as you've most likely noticed, the universe isn't always on my side.

 _'Lets face it, it's never on your side.'_

I finished the route and slowly made my way over to the soccer field for practice, shaking my head once in a while and taking deep breaths to dispel the dizziness that was beginning to plague me. I managed to stumble my way to the field and saw everyone stretching and getting ready. I once again took a deep breath and tried to compose myself, all I need to do is not over do it and everything should be fine.

 _'Well aren't you just the optimist today.'_

"Yumi-chan!" I looked up to see Erika waving at me enthusiastically, "You're a bit late today." I gave her a weak smile, "Sorry, my delivery route took a little longer than normal." She just laughed and continued to help Reika stretch. _'Well she believed you but the real problem is going to be the triplets.'_ I glanced at them as the thought crossed my mind and they seemed to be absorbed in whatever conversation they were having so that was a plus.

 _'They won't be for long though.'_ Sighing I sat myself down and leaned against the wall. If I stayed here then everything would be fine.

Today's focus was the team's strong points and what each person was good at or something along those lines. To be honest, I completely spaced out and when practice finished I barely managed to lift myself of the ground. _'Here we go.'_

"Yumi-chan, are you alright? You've been zoning out all day." I looked over at Reika who had concern written all over her face. This comment also brought the attention of the Furuyas over to me. Damn it, I was so close to getting away. _'What did you expect, the universe is against you remember.'_

"Y-yeah..." my voice sounded really weak and I was suddenly hit with another wave of dizziness, "...I'm just a little.." Darkness started creep in from the corner of my eyes, "..tired." The last thing I registered was falling to the ground and concerned voices shouting out to me but before I could respond, everything became dark.

The next thing I knew was staring at an unfamiliar ceiling. I blinked a few times and found that I felt better but was completely dumbfounded as to how I got here. I was currently in a bedroom that clearly was not my own or even in my house.

 _'Where am I'_

"Feeling better Mi-chan?" I turned my head to the side to see the Ryuuji leaning against the bedroom door. I instantly sat up, but quickly regretted it when my head began to pound in protest. "Easy mouse, you shouldn't strain yourself." Ozou walked in carrying a glass of water and Kota followed behind shortly after. "You gave us quite the scare." He handed me the glass and I gratefully took it, taking only small sips, nearly moaning at the relief it gave my dehydrated throat.

"What happened and where am I?" I asked quietly after finishing the glass.

"You fainted." I tilted my head at Kota and Ryuuji continued for him, "You collapsed from a fever and we decided to bring you to our house after coach confirmed than it wasn't anything serious." I stared at them for a few seconds before looking down in embarrassment.

 _'~That means they carried you all the way here~'_

"T-thank you." I mumbled out.

"You really should be taking care of yourself mouse." Ozou scolded and I only nodded in reply. "Anyway, coach said that you should rest instead of coming to the match tomorrow." I looked up at Ryuuji, ready to protest but Kota cut me off, "Yu, rest." I huffed and pouted a little. "He's right Mi-chan, just stay here until you feel well enough and we can take you home later."

I opened my mouth to protest but Ozou beat me to it, again.

 _'~Can't get a word in can you~'_

"Don't worry mouse, we'll tell you all about it later, just get some sleep." He ruffled my hair and they left. I stared at the door for a few seconds, trying to fully process what just happened but eventually I gave up and went back to sleep.

 _'Not much point in fighting it huh.'_

Nothing much happened for the next two days, I slept for the most part and practiced a little piano here and there but it was mostly lazing around the house. My parents had come home and as predicted I got a scolding followed by immediate fussing from my mother side and my father, he simply chuckled at the sight of it all. Traitor.

The whole team had a bit of a break now and I was taking full advantage of it by spending as much time as I could practicing for my recital, which was extremely pleased about. I was now able to consistently play the pieces with little to any mistakes and that was what I was really happy about to be honest, even though my fingers felt like they would fall off at any second.

 _'Don't be so dramatic Yumi.'_ I shook my head and walked out of the house.

Today's weather was rather pleasant so I decided to take a walk just for the fun of it and after thinking about it, I felt somewhat inclined to show my gratitude to the Furuyas for taking care of me however. The question was how to go about doing that. Maybe I should bake them something? Nah to cliched, how about I get them a present but then again, isn't that what their fan-girls do? I shuddered at the memory of Shou handing them the presents those girls gave him. Nope, definitely not doing that.

 _'Why don't we just go over there and thank them huh? What's wrong with that?'_

Well that's easier said than done. First I'll have to get the courage to head over there, then the guts to ring the bell which will probably take about ten minutes, then even if I somehow manage this feat, I'll have to actually speak to them in coherent sentences and try not to make an idiot out of myself. Which, let's be honest is most likely gonna happen whether I talk or not.

 _'Man, you really are a downer.'_

"~Oh Mi-chan~" I snapped out of my mental debate and looked around, only to find the Furuyas standing in front of me. _'Speak of the devils and they shall appear.'_ They made their way over to me.

"Spacing out again mouse?" Ozou's arm made it's way around my shoulders,"I thought we told you not to do that." His tone of voice didn't sound the least bit firm and by the look on his face I could tell that he was definitely more amused than anything. We were walking now, Ozou's arm still over my shoulders, Ryuuji and Kota walking on the other side of me. "Where are you headed to Mi-chan? Piano lesson?"

"Oh, um n-no," I gulped.

 _'C'mon Yumi! Get a grip.'_

"I t-thought that i-it was a nice d-day for a walk." Breathing a mental sigh of relief, I waited for their response. "It is rather pleasant today." Ryuuji began. "Definitely a good day for a walk." Ozou continued and Kota only nodded in agreement.

I tilted my head at them, "H-ho-how about you?" They glanced at each other, like they were having a mental conversation, then they smirked.

 _'Uh oh'_

"Well, mouse, we were actually hoping you would like to go on a date with us?"

 _'And que blush'_ I think I stopped breathing. They all looked rather satisfied with my expression and chuckled softly. "A-a-a-a D-D-A-DA-DATE?!" My voice came out really high and squeaky, like a mouse.

 _'Well isn't that ironic.'_

"Yes Mi-chan, a date." Ryuuji clarified before continuing, "How about getting some ice-cream at the park?" My mind seemed to be far to slow to catch up though and I only managed to mumble out 'a date' again. Ozou laughed, "I think we broke her."

Before I knew it we were at the park and I was seated in a park bench with Kota while Ryuuji and Ozou went to buy the ice-cream. Kota's arm was now around my shoulder and he looked extremely peaceful right now. He seemed to staring at nothing, like he was stuck inside some deep thoughts or conversations with himself.

 _'Only you get lost in conversations with yourself Yumi.'_

"Yu." I blinked, focusing my attention back to Kota, who had a small smirk on his face as glanced at me from the corner of his eye. "You're staring." I, again, turned bright red and stammered out 'sorry', my hands suddenly becoming extremely interesting. He laughed quietly and tightened his his around my shoulders, pulling me closer to him. "Cute." I could only hide behind my bangs in attempt to hide my burning face.

 _'Well this is embarrassing.'_

"Here you go Mi-chan." Ryuuji's voice snapped me out of my pity party and I gladly took the ice-cream he offered me. Yum, ice-cream. _'You're so easily satisfied.'_

The rest of the afternoon was spent mostly sitting on the park bench talking. My nerves seemed to fade away as we went on and I found out a lot of things about them that I hadn't known before. Apparently after this soccer season, the triplets were going to separate into their own individual goals, Kota continuing soccer since it was his passion, Ozou going to focus more on his families martial arts dojo and Ryuuji would be furthering his studies. I smiled as they told me because I could see the determination in their and come on, who wouldn't be inspired by that. When asked about my goals, I told them that I hoping to get into a good music school and eventually go on to composing my own music. Ozou ruffled my hair and asked if I would give them private concert to which my brain yet again malfunctioned and I could barely mutter out a 'maybe'.

The day however, had to come to an end at some point and I couldn't help but feel a little disappointed walking back home. When we reached my house I turned to face them, "Well, thank you for today," I smiled brightly, "I had fun."

"We had fun too Mi-chan." Ryuuji returned my smile while Ozou patted my head, "Yeah mouse, we'll go out again soon okay?" I nodded happily and waved them goodbye.

I gave a heavy sigh when plopped down on my bed, fully content with this strange warm feeling I had inside me.

 _'You forgot to thank them for the other day Yumi.'_

"Damn it!"

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 **Thank you so much for reading.**

 **Comment/review to let me know what you think. :)**


	14. Special Training?

_**Hi everyone! Sincerest apologies for this extremely late update. I've recently gone back to college and haven't been able to find the tome or energy to write. Hopefully I'll manage a few more. Thanks so much for your patience. Please enjoy!**_

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"Yumi-chan..."

"Hmm?"

"D-do you think you could give me special training?"

"...huh?"

That was pretty much how this all started. It was a normal to begin with, I did my usual morning routine and then somehow found myself in the park with Reika. It was a few days before our match with Aoto's team and everyone was trying their best to get ready for the next game. Especially after they heard about Aoto scoring all the goals in his previous match, by himself.

 _'Idiot.'_

Reika had called me the night before, asking if I could meet her at the park after my delivery route and here we are now. Reika looking at me with hopeful eyes and me, gaping like a fish.

 _'Real attractive Yumi.'_

"Come again?"

"Um...welll.." She seemed really nervous, "I want to get my endurance up, so I was wondering if you could give me some stamina training?" After finishing, she fiddled with her hands and looked at the ground.

I stared for a moment, "Well, I guess I could..." Her eyes lifted, "I mean, I'm not a professional but I could probably show you a few things." The next thing I knew, I was being enveloped in a tight hug.

 _'This girl doesn't know her own strength.'_

"Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!" She squealed all the while hugging me tighter.

"No... problem." I strained out and she let go with a bright smile. I led her back to my house, deep in thought as to how I was going to go about doing this when I saw mom walking home with a bag of groceries in her arms.

"Ah Yumi-chan, Reika-chan!" She addressed us brightly, "What are you two up to today? Is there no soccer training?" I ignored Reika's look of panic and answered, "We all have a few days to prepare but Reika asked if I could help her with her endurance." My mother hummed in acknowledgement.

"You could always use our old training gear if you'd like."

"A-are you sure Kamikaze-san?"

"Why of course," My mother smiled gently, heading inside the house, "Might as well since Yumi is past that type of training and I barely get time to train myself." We followed her inside the house and watched as she placed the groceries on the counter. "Just make sure you don't overdo it and I won't complain." Reika bowed while thanking her and I just giggled at her.

After grabbing the correct equipment, we made our way back outside. "Okay so I guess we'll start of easy." I helped Reika put on some light wrist and ankle weights, "These will help build muscle in your arms and legs while you run, so not only will you be working on your endurance but your strength as well." She seemed a bit dazed while lifting her arms and legs to test the heaviness of the weights. "Um..are you sure this will work?" Her voice shook a little.

"Well this is how I was trained and that was at the age of four so trust me, you'll do fine."

"Y-y-you s-started at f-four!" I blushed at her bewildered expression and mumbled a quiet yes.

"I-i-incredible!" And que tomato face.

 _'You really can't take a complement can you.'_

Shaking my head, we started off on a light jog and when I say light, I mean like snail pace. I figured since she's been playing in recent games that she would have developed more stamina but watching take a breather every ten minutes was a little sad. She apologized profusely for it and I just told her to walking if she felt like she couldn't run anymore, just to keep moving forward. She seemed grateful that I wasn't pushing her.

 _'Looks like you have your work cut out for you.'_

We finished about mid-day and I had to sweat-drop as I watched Reika collapse the minute we reached my house. "I... don't think...I can...do...this." She managed to say while gasping for air.

"You did great, we'll do that every day until you can do it without stopping." She groaned quietly and I had to say that I was enjoying this a little too much. When I started, mom became the equivalent of a drill sergeant and breaks were not really an option, so watching someone else suffer the same training is a little bit entertaining to say the least.

 _'You're a sadist Yumi.'_ She left after a glass of water and strict instructions to take it easy for the rest of the day.

"Yumi." I looked over to my mother, now fully dressed in her track gear, "What do you say we do some training ourselves?" I tilted my head in curiosity. "I'm feeling a bit restless so why not?" I nodded and we commenced our warm up to the field near the river.

 _'Wonder what's making her restless?'_

When we got there we did some suicide runs and sprints before mom declared us officially ready for our run. We had managed to map out a pretty decent route that seemed to push us both to the limit on days like this. This was not just some friendly competition between us but also a chance for me to show her how much I've improved since the last time we raced, which was that afternoon when dad came home from his extended business trip.

 _'We tied with her then.'_

"Yumi." I looked over at her while doing some last minute stretches, "We have to tell your father soon." My heart skipped a beat and from her expression I could tell she was serious. "He's coming home tonight and he doesn't have any more trips planned for a while." She turned her gaze towards me, "He'll find out about the change in your piano schedule and he'll wonder why you're spending so much more time outside than usual." I looked at the ground, my feet becoming interesting, but I knew that she was right. My father didn't get where he was today without being clever after all.

"So let this not only be a race but a chance to build up some courage," She smiled looking ahead, "Everything will be alright as long as we keep moving forward right?" She looked down at me again and I took a deep breath and nodded.

 _'We're screwed.'_

And we were off, keeping a steady pace, I was able stay by mom's side, not faltering nor pushing to keep up, it was comfortable and that surprised me. Running always made me calm and cleared my head from everything that buzzed in my continuously stimulated mind and I found myself thinking that it was going to be alright, that no matter what as long as I kept moving forward, everything would be alright.

 _'Yup, we're so screwed.'_

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 ** _Thank you for reading, please leave a comment to let me know what you think._**


	15. Dilemma?

Dilemma!?

 **Hi everyone, I'm really sorry for the delay, life seemed to run away with me for a while there and I also had some trouble trying to write this chapter so that decreased my motivation further. Hopefully you enjoy this chapter even if it's a little depressing haha.**

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"No."

"But dad-"

"No!"

"Dear, please be reasonable-"

"I SAID NO!"

I flinched.

 _'Well this is going well.'_ So, we finally told him the whole story and to be honest, he really wasn't taking it well. All I know is that the dining table has never looked more interesting as I tried to avoid my father's eyes.

"I can't believe that this is what you've been doing with your time. It's outrageous!" Okay so saying he wasn't taking it well might not be the best term to describe this situation. In all fairness, we kind of expected this to happen. My mother and I explained everything that had been happening, how it started, why I didn't tell them at first and then to the present, which wasn't a very pleasant place to be.

 _'I told you we were screwed.'_ I clenched my fists and tried to disappear behind my bangs as my father directed a rather cold and disappointing glare at me. He looked incredibly frightening in this moment, arms crossed in front of his chest, brown eyes piercing me in a way that I'd never thought they could and to top it all off, the look was as if I had just betrayed him in the cruellest of ways.

 _'I just want to crawl under a rock and die.'_

My mother looked more than frustrated, "Shun, please try and be a little more open-minded." She gave me a fleeting glance, "Yumi has worked very hard in both soccer coaching and her piano lessons." My father didn't so much as bat an eye but she pressed on, "She's proven more than capable at managing both things. Aren't you proud that your daughter has been able to make so many wonderful friends and achieve so much alongside them?" I dared look up my father, a sliver of hope in my eyes but it was immediately exterminated as I met his stone-cold face.

"So, I should just overlook the fact that this has been going on behind my back then?" My heart stammered and I looked down again, not at all willing to face him. "I have never been so disappointed in you Yumi." I flinched again, "I thought I made it perfectly clear that your focus should be on what's important. How do you expect to become a successful composer if you spend your time traipsing about with some amateur soccer team!?" His voice had risen at this point and I desperately wished to disappear, waiting for his final onslaught. "I expected more from you."

 _'And there it is.'_ Tears were beginning to gather in the corners of my eyes, my breathing stuttered and my heart felt like it was going more than a hundred miles a minute.

"Shun!"

"No, I won't hear any more of this nonsense, Yumi go to your room."

I wasted no time scurrying out of there as fast as my legs could carry me and firmly shut my bedroom door behind me. My heart was still pounding, my breathing erratic and the tears from before were now streaming down my face.

 _'Breathe Yumi!'_ But I couldn't find it within myself to follow my minds orders. Everything was spinning out of control and there was no way to stop it. I could hear my parents arguing downstairs so I shoved a pillow over my head in an attempt to drown it out.

What's going to happen now? What do I tell the team? What about the Furuyas? Will he let me see them again?

The next thing I knew, it was morning.

 _'Looks like we fell asleep.'_ My throat was dry, my eyes felt swollen and I had a pounding headache. The fact that my alarm clock was blaring didn't help. With a heavy sigh, I forced myself out of bed and proceeded with the normal routine.

 _'This is going to suck.'_

I hesitantly made my way downstairs and peeked into the kitchen. My father was sitting at the table reading today's newspaper and my mother was making breakfast. The atmosphere was tense and all I wanted to do was climb back in bed. Swallowing my fear, I sat down at the table, head bowed and bangs in front of my eyes.

"Yumi, I expect you to return home immediately after school. I've also taken the liberty of contacting that soccer coach and informed him of the necessary details." With no room for argument all I did was meekly nod my head though I could practically feel the frustration rolling of my mother. _'So, he called coach.'_ I ate breakfast and made my way to school. My heart was heavy and I knew I'd have to explain to everyone. But what do I say?

 _'We're going to get sick again.'_

I made all attempts to avoid Erika, Shou and Reika, using my bangs as a shield, I made sure to stay in music room during recess and lunch. There were a few close calls where either one of them tried to get my attention but luckily, I had become a master at avoiding people, as sad as that sounds, right now it was something I was grateful for. _'This is ridiculous Yumi.'_ Sighing for seemed like the hundredth time today I trudged my way out of the school grounds and made my way home.

"Yumi-chan!" I froze and turned to see Reika making her way towards me. There was no room for avoiding or running away so I just stood there and waited. Her eyes showed heavy concern, "Yumi-chan, are you alright? You've been acting strange all day." Before I could register or prevent it, tears started forming at the corner of my eyes and began escaping down the side of my face again. _'Dammit.'_

"Yumi-chan..." I shook my head in attempt to get my head cleared of the fog that suddenly surrounded it. "Your father found out didn't he." It was a statement not a question. I nodded and she gave a look of understanding that I greatly appreciated. "What will you do?"

"I don't know." My voice came out choked and I attempted to gain control of my emotions before continuing, "My father has forbidden me from soccer and has already spoken to coach Hanashima." The tears finally stopped but I felt worse than before, if that's even possible.

"I see." There wasn't much she could do about it even if she wanted to, Reika understood more than anyone what it was like to be trapped in this kind of situation. Wanting to follow the path you choose or obeying your parent's wishes was the hardest thing anyone had to face. _'We're way too young to be dealing with this.'_

I snapped out of my thoughts when I felt arms wrap around me. Reika was hugging me as if I was about fall apart, probably true, I return the hug weakly before she let go, "Good luck Yumi-chan, I'll try and explain to the others." I gave a small but thankful smile as she went off to practice.

 _'She's so nice.'_ I sighed once again and made my way home where things were quiet, my parents were most likely still at work and I didn't have a piano lesson today so that left me to my own devices for now. I didn't feel like eating so I just made my way straight to bed and curled up in a ball.

 _'What the hell are we going to do about the Furuyas?'_

I sighed again.

* * *

 **There it is, again sorry for the delay, please be as patient as possible when it comes to updating and let me know what you think.**


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